


More than an Alibi

by Okay_Boomer



Category: Among Us (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Betrayal, Blood and Injury, Crack Treated Seriously, Cute but like also very not cute, Dark, M/M, Protectiveness, Slow Burn, now with art, world building
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-11-27
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:36:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 29,930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27122614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Okay_Boomer/pseuds/Okay_Boomer
Summary: There was a low chuckle as Corpse emerged from the shadows and a heavy hand landed on Sykkuno's shoulder, "I was worried the worst had happened to you when I didn't find you in admin where I'd left you. Glad to see you're still okay."𝗦𝘆𝗸𝗸𝘂𝗻𝗼 𝘁𝗿𝘂𝘀𝘁𝘀 𝗖𝗼𝗿𝗽𝘀𝗲. 𝗘𝘃𝗲𝗻 𝘄𝗵𝗲𝗻 𝗵𝗲 𝘀𝗵𝗼𝘂𝗹𝗱𝗻'𝘁.
Relationships: 5up/Yeti, Anthony | ChilledChaos/Steven | ZeRoyalViking, CorpseKuno - Relationship, Crewmate/Impostor (Among Us), Sykkuno/Corpse Husband
Comments: 327
Kudos: 3450





	1. The Imposters

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! General disclaimer that I don't think any of these ships are actually "real"; I just think they're cute.
> 
> Also I went back and added some pictures I drew, just for fun.

Lights were out again.

It was completely dark. Only the dim glimmers of various battery-powered buttons and screens illuminated the space around him and continuing his task was impossible like this. Sykkuno gave up and let the wires fall back down. Lights had to be fixed before he could continue with his already somewhat suspect wire connecting. He blindly felt along the steel wall, making his way down to electrical one unsteady foot at a time. He looked down instead of ahead because the last time he'd run to the reactors he'd quite literally stumbled over a dead body. As if that hadn't been traumatic enough, the rest of his crew had completely jumped on him for somehow missing the body despite being _right on top of it._ So now he took his time, scanning the ground as he picked his way alone through the ship.

It was probably dangerous not to be grouped up with someone else but after the last body had been found, everyone was wary of him. Well, everyone except—

" _There you are._ I thought I'd lost my green little buddy," the sudden voice from behind him made Sykkuno yell as he ran straight into the metal wall next to him.

"F— G— Gosh! You startled me, Corpse," the green crewmate laughed nervously, his voice hiccuping as he caught his breath. There was a low chuckle as Corpse emerged from the shadows and a heavy hand landed on his shoulder, "sorry. I was worried the worst had happened to you when I didn't find you in admin where I'd left you. Glad to see you're still okay."

"Yeah, I forgot I had a task in storage," Sykkuno said and then realized belatedly how that could be seen as a bit suspicious, "I swear. I'm just...bad at remembering where all my tasks are."

"I know, I didn't think you were lying," Corpse said good-naturedly as he looked down the hall, "Let's go check out electrical together. Someone should have turned the lights back on already so I'm starting to think something bad happened."

"That sounds good! I was just going to check it out mysel—"

" **Don't.** " Corpse's voice was deadly serious.

"I— What?" A chill ran up his spine.

Corpse shook his head and pulled Sykkuno after him by the wrist, "don't go off on your own. Especially not to electrical. Stick with me and stay where I put you when I go to do tasks in other rooms, alright?"

Sykkuno grinned lopsidedly at the way it sounded like Corpse was disciplining an untrained dog but followed along after his friend in the dark regardless, just a short step behind him the whole way there. As they neared electrical, the stench of _something_ was becoming more and more evident even through their helmets. A stench that Sykkuno had definitely encountered before, he realized with a sudden onset of terror. He abruptly stopped walking and clutched Corpse's wrist to pull his friend back as well.

"Wait. It— Someone's _dead_ in there," Sykkuno whispered as he whipped his head around, making sure there wasn't anyone close to them, "the killer might still be nearby."

Corpse glanced behind them but then shook his head, "it's okay. I don't think the killer would take both of us on. Let's just find the body and report it to the others so we can talk about what to do." That sounded reasonable. The steady, sure way Corpse said it both calmed Sykkuno's nerves and made them skyrocket with how _unnatural_ it seemed for someone to be so nonplussed upon discovering a murder. He hesitated a second before he nodded and they walked into the room that always seemed even darker than the rest of the ship.

Blood. Blood was everywhere.

Even in the dark, that much was evident. On the floor was the bottom half of what was once the body of Junk. Now his skin was stained with blood and he was lying in a pool of the liquid at the bottom of the light cabinet. It looked like the top half of his body had been dragged to the back of the room and down into a vent from the marks on the floor. Sykkuno gasped and tightened his hold on Corpse's tuxedo while the other crewmate simply stepped over the remains of Junk and flipped on the lights. The overhead lamps flickered on after a couple seconds and Sykkuno winced at the sudden glare.

"Poor Junk," Corpse murmured as he fished around his suit for his emergency communication device. He flicked it open and pressed the button that notified the rest of the crewmates. There were only five...no, four of them left now. He held down the call button as he held the mic up to his helmet, "hey, we found Junk's body in electrical. Everyone meet in the cafeteria to discuss." He put away the device and looked down at Sykkuno, "we should head up."

Sykkuno was still staring numbly at the carnage, his face pale behind the visor of his helmet. "I think I'm going to get sick." he mumbled weakly as he leaned heavily against the wall. His legs were going to give out anyway so he slid down the metal to sit down on the floor. After all of the previous bodies, the others had built up a tolerance, but he still got faint at the sight of blood. Corpse kneeled down next to him and placed a hand on either side of Sykkuno's helmet, "hey. Hey. It's going to be okay, alright? I won't let anything happen to my green little buddy. If you lean on me do you think you can you walk?"

Sykkuno nodded numbly as he was helped to his feet again and he leaned against Corpse's shoulder as they staggered their way to cafeteria.

Ze and Chilled were already there, seated on opposite ends of the main cafeteria table. They didn't like each other. Well, that wasn't _quite_ true. They liked each other well enough but they always seemed to get into heated debates about who the imposters were and why. Both of them wove together theories and made outlandish connections that Sykkuno honestly couldn't follow on even his best days. Corpse helped him sit down on one of the chairs and then went around the table to sit down next to Chilled.

Sykkuno tilted his head in confusion since usually Corpse sat next to him during lunch. A rock formed in his stomach at the thought that maybe he'd scared away his only remaining friend. He _had_ looked pretty suspicious after all, being so close to electrical when Corpse had found him.

Sykkuno opened his mouth to defend himself when suddenly all of the cafeteria doors slammed shut and Ze spun around in his seat to look.

"What the fuck—"

"There's only four of us left, Ze." Chilled said, his voice smooth with just the slightest undercurrent of a smile beneath the words. Ze turned to face him with a slow look of horror creeping over his face. "What do you mean? ...Wait. There are still two imposters, aren't there? Tay wasn't an imposter—"

"No, she wasn't," Chilled agreed with a gleeful smile, "you were right about her. Just like you were right about a lot of things. Honestly it's a shame you always look too suspicious for anyone to take seriously."

"If there are two then— Shit!" Ze leapt to his feet but it was obvious that there was nowhere to go. "Which of you are the imposters? I know it's you Chilled but who else? It's you, isn't it Corpse."

Sykkuno's heart stuttered in his chest as the accusation sunk in. He looked at Corpse too, his eyes wide behind his mask as his lungs refused to work. It _couldn't_ be. They'd been vouching for each other the entire trip. Corpse had saved him from being voted out multiple times. He'd been the only who believed in Sykkuno's innocence after he was found with the previous body. _Because he probably killed them himself,_ his mind whispered but he shook the thought loose.

"It can't be Corpse, h-he was with me in admin. We were only separated for a few minutes—"

"Yeah, and how long do you think it takes them to _murder_ , Sykkuno? We know the murderers have been using the vents. He had you wrapped around his finger the entire time. Was just using you as a convenient alibi. It's so _obvious_ now." Ze seethed, "they were probably just saving us to eat last—"

" **Shut up.** " Corpse growled and Chilled rolled his eyes next to him, "Keep yours quiet or my fangs might just find themselves in his throat."

Tears sprung to Sykkuno's eyes and he scrunched his fingers in his suit, "a-are you going to eat us?"

Chilled laughed while Corpse stayed silent next to him, "if we wanted to kill you, we would have done it ages ago. I could've snapped Ze's neck just a few minutes ago in medbay. Which, by the way, nice scan. _Great_ to know you're innocent." He giggled a little at the end and it sounded just a touch left of insane.

Ze scowled, his fists clenched tight at his sides. Sykkuno wished he could look that brave too, but instead it felt like he and the rest of the ship were falling down out of space.

"Then what _are_ you going to do with us?" Ze's eyes narrowed, only the slightest hint of nerves straining his voice.

Chilled glanced over at Corpse and raised an eyebrow. Corpse just leaned back in his chair, giving him a small nod.

"The rest of your crew wasn't eaten. Using our mouths is just the fastest way to kill. We didn't kill for the nourishment. In fact, we can live just fine off the same things the both of you do. No, this is a rite of passage for our kind. When we come of age it's tradition for two of us to infiltrate one of your kinds' ships and, well, take 'em all out. The two surviving crew members are trophies of sorts. You're mine, and Sykkuno is Corpse's."

The blood had all but left Sykkuno's face as he listened. It was just a challenge for them. A sick, twisted _game_ and somehow he and Ze were the rewards. His friends had died for coming of age festivities.

"Why...us?" Ze whispered, his brave front finally crumbling.

Chilled stood up and walked towards him, "because, I _like_ you. 'Sides, you were the biggest challenge on this ship and it's more impressive to bring you home than some sheep who just went with the crowd's votes." Ze took a step back but Chilled was faster, pushing him against the wall, which was accompanied by the sound of Ze's helmet bouncing off the metal. He said something else but Sykkuno pulled his gaze away from the two of them when a familiar hand landed on his shoulder. He startled and scrambled backwards off of the chair. He hit the floor and stared up at Corpse's black visor in the glare of the lights. "G-Get away from me! You killed Toast, didn't you? You're a monst—"

Corpse kneeled in front of him and it caught Sykkuno off-guard, reminding him of all the times Corpse had done that in the past. All the times Corpse had helped him with his tasks or accompanied him around the ship to make sure he was safe. Had all of those moments been fake? Corpse being happy to greet him every morning? That almost-kiss behind a boulder in the snow field? Hot tears welled up in his eyes again and he choked on his next words, instead simply hanging his head as he was pulled into a tight hug. A hand rubbed his back and he let a few sobs escape.

"I'll never hurt you." Corpse whispered and it struck Sykkuno again just how trustworthy he seemed. Some part of him still unwaveringly trusted that voice, despite everything Sykkuno had just learned, despite what he had just _witnessed._ He shook his head and tried to get away again but the hold on him was too strong. He gave up and an untempered anger flared under his skin at how _weak_ he was.

"Just kill me," he spat, tears still streaming down his face as blotches of red stained his cheeks, "I'm not your— your _prize_."

Corpse's eyebrows drew together and for some reason he looked sad. Why did _he_ look sad? It wasn't fair that the look made Sykkuno feel guilty. Made his heart clench in his chest like a vice was wrapped around it. Fuck, he'd been harboring feelings since day one and now on day who-the-fuck-knew-what, Corpse had practically become his rock. He'd been Sykkuno's reason for being happy to suit up and do mundane tasks every day. Even when the killings had started he hadn't felt scared, not really, so long as Corpse was there. His friend had felt unkillable. He hadn't been scared once and it had made Sykkuno feel brave too. Now that part made a little more sense.

The feelings battling themselves out in his chest made less sense.

Corpse took a deep breath and then let it out again, fogging up the inside of his helmet, "I picked you because...you're." Corpse hesitated like he couldn't think of the words. Like he couldn't think of _any_ words. Sykkuno stared at him incredulously and then let out a laugh that sounded more like a sob then anything else, "you can't even think of anything?"

Corpse frowned and shook his head, "not like that. On my planet we don't have a word for it. I know you call it 'love' but the word just seems. Insufficient. Also not entirely accurate since our species don't have the same emotional capacities."

_Love._

"Yeah right. I'm just an easy target."

"I mean, your self-preservation instincts _are_ non-existent. I could have picked anyone though, and you're the one who I wanted to take back with me. I don't want to hurt you ever, Sykkuno. Wouldn't know what to do without my little buddy."

Off on the other side of the room, Chilled and Ze were still arguing and it almost felt like any other day. It felt strangely like _business as usual_ and that was probably exactly what the imposters had been aiming for. They'd made the rest of the crew distant and distrustful of both Ze and Sykkuno to better manipulate them now. To make them dependent. Nothing made sense anymore except for Corpse's words, which had _always_ made sense.

"I'm scared," Sykkuno admitted quietly.

Corpse nodded, "I know, but nothing will ever hurt you again. It'll just be you and me."

Just them.

Forever.

* * *


	2. The Vents

Days passed by slowly on the Skeld.

The hallways were empty and barren, the cafeteria just a room with too many tables and chairs, and the stars were sometimes the only lights in the entire ship. Apparently imposters really did prefer it dark, even outside of hunting. Corpse and Chilled let them walk around—communications were indefinitely broken and there was nothing on the ship they could use to attack with—and the ship had never felt bigger and smaller at the same time.

Sykkuno spent his days avoiding navigation, where Chilled and Corpse regularly spent time charting and planning the ship's course. Ze disappeared somewhere by himself most days and Sykkuno could never find him, no matter how hard he looked. Chilled always found him at the end of the day though, one way or another. It had become increasingly obvious over the course of the last few weeks that imposters were creatures of the hunt; they were very good at it. It was almost surprising that the rest of their crew had lasted as long as they had.

Sykkuno didn't even bother hiding. He just sat on an empty container in storage and watched the stars pass by outside through an oval window. He only went up to the cafeteria at the end of the day when Chilled and Corpse gave them food. They really did eat the same food as them, and the freeze-dried meals were either eaten in absolute silence or during a scream match between Ze and Chilled. The two of them never seemed to tire of getting absolutely enraged at each other, and sometimes Sykkuno worried that one day they'd take it too far—that Chilled would lash out with his infinitely more powerful body and blood would splatter the table—but they never went past shoving. If anything, it was a good night when the two of them got in another pointless argument; the completely silent meals were the worst.

Corpse, unlike Chilled with Ze, didn't hound Sykkuno at all. In fact, before everything was revealed, he'd sought Sykkuno out far more often. That's how they'd become friends in the first place. Sykkuno had been far too shy to speak with anyone other than Toast until Corpse had all but cornered him on the first week of the trip and asked for his name. After that they'd been more or less inseparable. Well, they _had_ been inseparable. Now the imposter just silently sat across the wide table from Sykkuno and slowly chewed his bag of space food while refusing to make eye contact. It drove Sykkuno a little insane.

He hated that some lonely part of him _wanted_ Corpse to corner him again and make him talk. To push and prod him on like Chilled did to Ze until he broke and spoke. At least then he'd have an excuse to, a justification. He missed Corpse's voice, his weighty touches, his jumpy laughs. Most of all he missed _them_ and the simple, blind trust he'd had in their relationship. He wanted it again so bad that Sykkuno knew if Corpse tried to sway him, he'd instantly bend to the imposter's favor again. All it would take was an apology, maybe another hug like the one Corpse had given him on the day The Truth was revealed.

But no, instead Corpse was waiting for him to crawl back like a child realizing that running away wasn't as fun as the movies had made it out to be.

There wasn't even anywhere to run to on the Skeld.

The ship felt like a cage. One with a single, deadly exit: the airlock.

And Sykkuno could wander the corridors forever and never _not_ see ghosts of his previous crew in the shadows. He'd walk into security and see Poki leaning against the camera panel, talking lowly with Hafu, but when he'd double-take it'd just be an empty room again. More than anyone else, it felt like Toast's ghost haunted him, judging him for being so blindly trusting. Sykkuno didn't blame him. Most of all though, Sykkuno knew he was losing his already slippery grip on sanity. Every time he startled at an apparition of nothing in the dark corridors, he knew he was spinning out. He had to talk to somebody.

He couldn't go back to Corpse though. Corpse had _killed_ his friends. Chilled scared him. Ze was...Ze was maybe even more unhinged than he was.

Sykkuno jumped off his container and paced the storage room nervously.

Corpse had killed his friends and— and that was _really bad._ It didn't matter how nice Corpse had always been to him. It'd probably all been an act. One that Sykkuno had been stupid enough to fall for. He wasn't _actually_ the person Sykkuno had fallen for. Fallen for so hard that he'd been all but blind to the imposter's strange movements and oddly timed disappearances. Corpse hadn't even done any of the usual _tasks_ for crying out loud. Sykkuno groaned and banged his helmet against the metal wall of the Skeld.

God, he'd been so _easy._ All Corpse had done was say a few nice things, follow him around the ship a couple times, and Sykkuno had been more than willing to go along with anything the other said. He felt hot tears well up in his eyes again and he didn't even try to blink them back. They fell onto his visor and blurred out his vision in a strange parody of the rain that fell back on his home planet.

He wallowed in the feeling for a few minutes, watching it slowly shift from regret to something more akin to anger. He didn't normally get mad. In fact, he couldn't remember the last time he'd ever yelled at anybody. He'd always tried to be upbeat for his friends, and most of the time he'd even succeeded. Now there was no one left to even be happy for.

With a flaring, new conviction, he spun away from the wall and strode towards navigation. He didn't even fully understand what he was doing as he stomped into the room and slammed a hand against the metal wall, "Corpse!"

Chilled turned around from the chart courser and raised an eyebrow. The seat next to his was empty.

All of Sykkuno's anger immediately evaporated and was replaced with a hot wave of humiliation. He laughed nervously and started to backtrack out of the room; Chilled was terrifying. "Oh, uhm. Sorry! I was just looking for—"

"For Corpse, yeah. I got that part," Chilled smirked as he pushed his chair back and he crossed the navigation room faster than Sykkuno could track. The white imposter loomed over him in the dim room and Sykkuno felt his heartbeat skyrocket as various images of his dead body played themselves behind his eyelids. Chilled could kill him so _easily_. Like he was nothing. A hand landed loudly next to his head against the wall and he had the distinct feeling that Chilled was enjoying his fear. It wouldn't be a surprise to learn that they could smell something like that.

Sykkuno swallowed and stared at his shoes, "where is he?"

Chilled smiled and it was all fangs, "probably still with Ze in medical."

Sykkuno's head snapped up, "did something happen? Did you—"

"Ze was _playing_ in the vents and hurt himself, calm down." Chilled's face darkened for a second, "crew shouldn't be in the vents. You're too fucking delicate and don't even have the eyes for it, so don't get any ideas." With that, Chilled turned on his heel and slumped back in his usual chair. His shoulders had a downward cast to them, and Sykkuno had the sinking feeling that he'd said something he shouldn't have. When he turned to leave, he saw an indent in the wall where Chilled's hand had been. He quickly left.

The closer he got to medbay, the more nervous he felt. He hadn't spoken to Corpse in a few weeks and he was both dying to be near him and too scared to even fully look at him. His legs felt embarrassingly unsteady as he saw a light shining from the entryway to medbay. The brightness stung his eyes and he paused for a few seconds to get used to it before quietly padding up to the doorway.

Ze was sitting on one of the beds with his astronaut suit sleeve rolled up to his elbow. There was a large, jagged gash across the side his forearm from what had probably been a nasty slip in the pitch black vents. Ze was dabbing at it with a completely soaked towel while Corpse riffled through some cabinets, presumably looking for a bandage. The sight of the bright blood froze Sykkuno in place for a second—memories of all the other times he'd seen blood flickering through his head—but he forced himself to walk into the room. Both Corpse and Ze turned their heads towards him in surprise as he marched in with his new-found conviction but said nothing as he knelt down to the bottom row of cabinets and quickly located the ship's first aid kit and a few rolls of gauze.

He pointedly ignored Corpse as he brought the supplies over to the bed Ze was sitting on and popped open the first aid lid. Everyone on the Skeld was supposed to have paramedic training, but Sykkuno was the only one who had actually gone to the optional courses on it and knew what he was doing. It was an unfortunate coincidence that he was also the worst with blood. With slightly shaky hands, he maneuvered Ze's arm so that it was elevated above heart-level and cleaned up the smeared blood around the wound. The bleeding had mostly slowed, so Sykkuno snapped on some gloves and uncapped a tube of antibiotic ointment.

"I forgot you actually know about this shit," Ze broke the silence, his voice a little hoarse with pain, and Sykkuno gave him a strained smile.

"Yeah, guess it's finally coming in handy, huh?" he said, his voice tight and slightly hysterical if he were to be completely honest with himself. He was doing his best not to pass out at the sight of the once white, now red towel lying innocuously on the blue sheets.

Ze grimaced as he rubbed in the cream and Sykkuno felt like wincing along with him. This was probably what his course instructor had meant about him being _too empathetic_. He wrapped the bandage up the length of Ze's forearm and tried to smile in a somewhat reassuring way as he instructed the red crewmate to not un-bandage or check on it since that would interrupt the clotting process. Ze nodded silently and suddenly looked very tired, if not a little defeated, which just made Sykkuno feel even worse. He helped the red crewmate lie down on a clean bed to rest and then all but dashed to dispose of his blood-stained gloves.

Corpse had vanished sometime during the whole process, but he came back later with food and a juice pack to help Ze replenish the blood he'd lost. They both stood at opposite sides of Ze's bed like divorced parents, the awkward silence almost tangible in its heaviness.

Ze must have felt it too because he spoke up, "Chilled was pretty mad."

Corpse hummed, staring at the various medication bottles on the side table.

"Do you think he'll kill me for almost getting myself killed?" Ze cracked an amused, somewhat cruel smile and Corpse huffed a laugh.

"No. He might chain you to the nav table though like he's always threatening to do."

Sykkuno hadn't heard Corpse's voice in so long that all he could do was stare as the imposter spoke.

"I'd kill _him_ if I had to listen to his voice all day," Ze rolled his eyes but Sykkuno couldn't help but think his tone was a little bit fond. He stared at Ze like he was looking at him for the first time. He'd _never_ heard the red crewmate sound like that. Especially not towards Chilled. Had something happened? Had he always sounded like that? Sykkuno blinked away his surprise and turned towards the counter to finish cleaning up. The blood washed away slowly, tainting the washing chamber pink, and Sykkuno had to close his eyes and count to ten to stop the world from spinning out of his control again.

"Get some rest," Corpse said to Ze, his voice as warm and caring as it'd always sounded, and it twisted up something dark and hurt inside of Sykkuno. It wasn't fair for him to sound like that. For him to be able to _act_ like that after all of the terrible things he'd done. Corpse put a hand on Ze's shoulder before leaving and Sykkuno almost lost it right there. He couldn't tell if he was more scared for Ze or more jealous of him right then. _Get a grip._

He walked back to the bed and helped Ze drink his juice through the helmet's receptacle.

_He doesn't love you._

And that had to be true.

* * *

_[[♪](https://youtu.be/If7WGXf0NE4)]_

That evening, Chilled took his dinner into medbay and didn't come back out, so that left him and Corpse to eat in silence at the round table. Sykkuno could hardly swallow his food through his nerves. He wanted to say something but he didn't know what. Another more stubborn part of him wanted him to stay silent and wait for Corpse to reach out first. To apologize and show remorse for killing all of Sykkuno's friends. Sykkuno would forgive him if he did, he knew he would. He had the sinking feeling though that Corpse never would, and they'd be stuck in this awful limbo until he broke. He was being treated like a new pet, one that just had to warm up to their owner and settle down. He wasn't a pet though, and he wasn't going to settle.

The anger flickered to life again under Sykkuno's skin and he more watched than registered himself stand up abruptly from the table and leave.

Usually he put his bags away and waited for everyone to finish but he couldn't stand to be around Corpse right then. Couldn't stand the crushing silence and Corpse just sitting there all... _innocently_. Like he hadn't done anything wrong. Like he hadn't completely derailed Sykkuno's life. Like he wasn't the only person Sykkuno ever wanted to talk to.

Sykkuno ran through storage and didn't stop until he wound up in reactor. He hid in one of the alcoves and drew up his knees, breathing heavy. Everything felt too tight, too small. He was running on pure adrenaline and he knew it was making him stupid. Making him act rashly but he could hardly care. He'd been sitting around for weeks like a docile creature, just waiting, and he was _done._ He wasn't going to take it anymore; he couldn't. His eyes flicked down to where his hand was resting on the grates of a vent and he numbly traced the edges of it.

_Stop being such a coward._

He hooked a finger under the lid and slowly lifted it to reveal the pitch hole beneath.

_Stop being so passive._

He dipped his hand inside the inky darkness and then shifted to slide his leg in instead. It was like watching it submerge into pool of night. He was entranced by how completely void of light the vent was. He imagined what it would be like to blindly feel his way around the metal walls. No wonder Ze had gotten hurt; the vents looked darker than space. At least there were stars in space. Who knew what was actually down _there_. For all he knew, he might accidentally run into the missing top half of Junk's body and not even realize it. Run into any number of things that Corpse was still hiding from him. What other truths were there left to be uncovered? Sykkuno's fingers tightened around the edge of the metal as his other leg joined the first.

How far did it go? What secrets lay in the hidden depths of the ship? If he died how long would it take someone to report it?

And if he died, would anyone even care?

He took a deep breath. Another one. He loosened his grip on the lip of the vent and—

"Sykkuno!"

Sykkuno was yanked backwards with such force that he slammed into the wall behind him with a deafening clang of noise. His head spun as he sprawled out on the floor and it wasn't until he was shaken that he had the presence of mind to look up. Corpse was above him, his eyes wild and bright red, and Sykkuno wondered if he should be afraid. He wasn't, but he probably should have been. He blinked a couple of times to try to right himself but whiplash just made everything spin faster.

"What were you **_doing_**?" Corpse growled—it really sounded feral, more beast than human—and Sykkuno winced at the fingers digging into his arms. His eyes were treacherously watering again, more at Corpse's tone than anything else, but he refused to cry again.

"Why do you care?" He yelled but it sounded wounded and all wrong. He wanted to try again but that would just look stupid.

Corpse's eyebrows drew together but he didn't answer as he lifted Sykkuno to prop him against the wall. He examined Sykkuno's helmet—probably checking for any cracks—and then pulled back with a tired sigh, "don't go in the vents, they're dangerous. You know that."

Sykkuno just glared at him and Corpse expression softened again with something sad, "sorry. I didn't mean to throw you against the wall."

The quiet apology made Sykkuno's breath catch and he couldn't help but bask in Corpse's attention. He'd been wanting it for so long that even just hearing the word 'sorry' out of Corpse's mouth was something akin to fantasy. He stared up at Corpse kneeling over him. In the darkness, the imposter almost blended into the shadows, and Sykkuno wondered again why he'd never even suspected the other for a second when he was so obviously _born_ to live in the murky corners of life. Satisfied that Sykkuno wasn't hurt, Corpse stood up to leave—presumably still set on waiting for Sykkuno to come around—but Sykkuno wasn't going to let the game continue.

He pushed himself up on unsteady feet.

Corpse didn't even make it to the door before Sykkuno slammed him face-first against the reactor from behind. The metal screeched under the sudden impact but didn't go off, and Sykkuno struggled to hold both of Corpse's hands behind the imposter's back. He was far weaker than Corpse, but he kept the other's arms locked at the center of his back with his entire weight, and after a few seconds the imposter stopped struggling.

"Full of surprises tonight, aren't you?" Corpse huffed, his cheek bruised against the inside of his helmet, and it made Sykkuno's blood go cold. He didn't even know what he was doing. But it didn't really matter either as long as he did _something_. As long as he had Corpse close and talking to him.

Maybe he'd finally gone off the deep end. Was this what breaking felt like?

Sykkuno knew his voice was trembling but he didn't care, "apologize to me. To Toast. To everyone you killed."

Corpse was silent for a few seconds before his voice filled the darkness around them again, "what good will that do? They're dead, Sykkuno. No apology will bring them back. Nothing I say will make it better." A thin line of blood dripped from Corpse's mouth and onto the inside of his visor and Sykkuno felt light headed all over again. It slid down the glass and he marveled with a sick kind of fascination at how vibrant it was. How different it was from his own blood.

"I want to hear you say it." Sykkuno whispered, pressing his weight against the imposter's shoulder cruelly. He wondered if he could ever merge his vision of Corpse with the monster he knew lurked inside his friend. He wondered if this was his way of trying to understand. What joy could be found in hurting others? He watched Corpse wince under the added pressure and didn't feel happy.

"Say it."

Corpse stayed silent.

" _Say it._ "

Silence.

Sykkuno seethed in frustration and kicked Corpse's leg out from under him, bringing the other to the ground as he kneeled on either side of his back, "why won't you just apologize to me? All you have to do is say sorry and I'll—" Sykkuno stopped there, a sob bubbling up from his chest, and he dropped his head against Corpse's shoulders. "Just do it."

Corpse was frozen beneath him, his chest hardly moving to even breathe. Then he slowly turned his head against the metal and said, "I won't."

"Why?" Sykkuno whispered.

"Because I don't feel sorry," Corpse said simply, without a trace of emotion.

Sykkuno knew tears were slipping down his cheeks. Of course Corpse didn't care. He hadn't cared about any of them. He probably didn't even have the ability to—

"I had to kill them. Your friends wanted to eject you. I couldn't let that happen."

Sykkuno stared at him. "I— _What_?"

"They would have voted you off. You do tasks so slowly it was only a matter of time before someone called you out. You're found in the most suspicious places. Plus, you always sound so nervous it makes people think you're hiding something even though you've always been the nicest person on the whole goddamn ship."

Sykkuno blinked.

"I had to kill Toast because he was suspicious of you. I killed Junk because Chilled was with Ze and if it came to a vote, I don't know who you, Ze, and Junk would have voted for."

Sykkuno processed the information, "none of it would have happened in the first place if we'd never met."

Corpse rolled them over easily and Sykkuno stared up in shock at the sudden reversal. Corpse's eyes glowed in the dark like embers.

"I'll never be sorry for having met you."

A gloved hand cupped the back of Sykkuno's helmet softly, stopping it from meeting the metal floor, "but I'll wait as long as I have to for you to forgive me."

Sykkuno realized with a sudden clarity that he'd never stopped being absolutely head over heels for Corpse.

And maybe...just maybe Corpse had never stopped feeling the same for him back.

There wasn't a single logical thought running through his head as Sykkuno slid his hands behind Corpse's helmet and brought them together, their visors clinking softly.

"I'd kiss you right now. If I could," Sykkuno whispered, his face stained with tears and his cheeks pink.

Corpse's eyes shut, "this is already better than anything I could have hoped for."

* * *

Corpse sat next to him the next day during dinner. Ze hardly raised an eyebrow, and went back to correcting Chilled on the right terminology to use for the dials in navigation while the white imposter fed him.

Sykkuno let his hand curl around Corpse's a bit possessively between their chairs. Corpse was his, after all.

That was the trade off.

His life

for all of Corpse.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just had to add a little more to this fic. I'm not sure if I'll continue but I just thought the first chapter was begging for a little something more.


	3. The Medbay

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The story from Ze's perspective.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A commenter on the last chapter suggested that I write a chapter from Ze's pov and I couldn't shake the thought, so here it is!

Chilled was sus.

So, _so_ sus. That's what Ze had been saying the whole time. Upon the discovery of first body, Ze had just _known_. Felt it in his bones. Bones don't lie, but Chilled sure did. And for some nonsensical reason the crew just ate them up. They loved Chilled's lies and hated Ze's truths. Typical.

The only one who seemed the least bit impressed with his theories was, ironically, the man himself. Chilled absolutely delighted in them. The white crewmate never seemed more excited than when Ze was pointing a finger across the table at him, bringing up something supposedly incriminating the other man had done. _He didn't go to lights, I think he faked astroids, he looked at me weird, just vote him guys Jesus_. Each claim was met with increasingly exaggerated eye-rolls and, really, when Ze stood over the fourth dead body of the week he hardly even had the capacity to think something other than _you guys should have listened to me._

At first he thought Chilled would just out-right kill him for constantly trying to get him thrown from an airlock—at _least_ maybe sus him back during their emergency meetings—but Chilled never threw any doubt Ze's way. Which, honestly, was a blessing because the rest of the crew sure did that enough by themselves. He'd even written up a small will on a post-it note he'd found in Admin. _If dead: all **ZERO** of my belongings go to **NOBODY** because all of you are—_ he never did finish it because an alarm (they were constantly going off that week) interrupted his scrawl.

Ze was so sure it was Chilled though, that when there were only seven of them left, he stuck with the other man like glue. If they were all going to die, he _was_ going to be right in his final moments. He'd make the white crewmate look him in the eyes and give him the satisfaction of having known all along before he was brutally murdered. Not the worst way to go, honestly. And in the meantime, following Chilled around like a bloodhound proved to be surprisingly entertaining.

Chilled was just as prone to willful stubbornness as he was. So much so that their interactions reminded him of the basic physics training they'd received. More specifically: the unstoppable force paradox.

"What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object?" Lots of name calling, apparently.

They spent so much time together, in fact, that Ze started to...actually not hate the man anymore. Which was concerning, because he still definitely thought that Chilled was the one going around leaving bodies everywhere. It was just that he kind of liked their "talks" and the way Chilled was pretty much just as batshit crazy as he was. He liked the other man's manic laughter, the stupidly archaic glasses he wore under his helmet, and the vicious edge his voice took on when he got serious. It all fascinated and repelled him in turn.

He slept at the foot of Chilled's bunk every night—to make sure the other didn't go on a midnight spree—and strangely enough he'd never slept better that at the feet of a literal murderer. Maybe being a lone wolf for most of his life had made him desperate for some like companionship. Whatever it was, he slept great.

When Poki was found dead on the surveillance cams, Ze had to re-think his theory. Chilled had been with him the entire morning, so it couldn't have been him. But...

But Ze _knew_ he was right about Chilled. He'd already sunk his teeth in and he wasn't letting go.

"There are two imposters," he yelled frantically at the emergency meeting in the cafeteria. Cue eye-roll.

"Give it a rest, Ze," Tay snapped, "you're just trying to make your pet theory work and we need real answers. Chilled's innocent. _You're_ the one vouching for him this time."

Ze spun on her, "why are you defending him? It's you then. You're the second imposter."

She scowled, " _what?_ "

He slammed a hand on the table, "everyone else was accounted for. Corpse and Sykkuno are always together and I was with Chilled and Junk in admin. You're the only one who could have done it."

Everyone turned to stare at her and for the first time they all agreed with him. Sykkuno looked nervously between all of them, his hand curled tightly in the black fabric of Corpse's sleeve, before he followed Corpse in agreeing to eject her. Junk wasn't far behind, followed by Chilled, who just gave him a nondescript smile.

Ze would never forget the look she shot him as she was pushed out the air lock. It haunted him.

Sometimes he startled awake in the night from dreams of her hand reaching out to pull him into the abyss along with her. When he did, all he had to do was reach out and feel Chilled's warm body next to his. Alive, breathing. Chilled's heartbeat sounded weird, Ze learned on one of those restless night. It sounded different. Non-human. Like there were two, or maybe three hearts nestled inside his chest. All beating arrhythmically.

It was relaxing, Ze ultimately decided.

When there were only five of them left, Ze knew his time was coming to an end. He stared out at the faces of his crew—Corpse, Sykkuno, and Junk—one day and knew with a sick feeling of certainty that one of them was an imposter, and another one of them was a dead man walking.

That was The Day of Truth.

* * *

So Chilled had actually been sus.

Ze hoped his friends were turning in their starfield graves. He'd been right.

Sort of.

He hadn't really anticipated Corpse being the second imposter, _sorry Tay_. Still being alive also hadn't been part of his predictions. Somehow Chilled had taken a shine to his ornery self and Ze was pretty sure that was the most shocking part of this whole fiasco. Chilled actually _liked_ him (in his own words), and Ze didn't know what the fuck he was meant to do with that knowledge.

There was no need for him to follow the man around either anymore, which left him feeling oddly stranded. He could only walk the Skeld's corridors so many times before his boredom bordered on unbearable. He wasn't some tame pet; he wasn't meant to be peacefully kept in confines. Chilled obviously thought that he had the upper-hand now with his night-vision and superior strength and... _everything_ , but Ze wasn't someone who just let others lord power over him like that. So he spent his days making life hard for the white imposter, just because he had nothing better to do, and because spite was a surprisingly good source of motivation.

First, he tried to hide around the ship, but that quickly proved to be a waste of time. Chilled always found him and Ze suspected that imposters had heightened senses in all five domains, not just vision. All of the normal hiding spots were no good, so Ze decided to think outside of the box. Thinking outside of the box ultimately led him to the vents. One lovely morning, he slipped into the vent in medbay and decided he liked it down there.

Sure, the vents were dark and narrow and filled with the strangest shit Ze had ever seen, but that was precisely _why_ he liked them. During his walks he'd found all kinds of things, ranging from knives to blood stains and once even a little, pink flower that looked strangely familiar. He managed to put together a makeshift flashlight—an LED connected to a single AA battery—and wandered the vents in his free time. It took a couple of days for Chilled to catch on to where he was slipping off to, and his confusion had Ze grinning so wide his cheeks hurt. Chilled's baffled, suspicious stare at dinner after a full day of sneaking around the vents had Ze biting back a smile the entire meal.

Of course, he was found out eventually.

It was a Friday. No, a Saturday? Honestly, days didn't mean jack shit anymore. The important thing was that on that day, Ze was wandering the vents like he usually did, minding his own business, when a hand caught his wrist.

Like any person with self-preservation instincts, he screamed in terror and tossed his tiny LED light in the direction the grab had come from. He also managed to trip backwards and land on a piece of scrap metal that was jutting out of the side of the vent innocuously. He yelled again but this time in pure pain as the metal sliced into his arm.

"You _idiot_ ," Chilled seethed, blinking rapidly (Ze had noted a while ago that imposters really weren't a fan of lights), "did you throw a _battery_ at me?"

Ze wanted to laugh at how upset Chilled sounded but instead he bit back a whimper as blood slid down his arm to pool in his elbow. Chilled's gaze snapped to the blood and all of a sudden Ze was being lifted like he weighed nothing. He started to object at the treatment but Chilled chose that moment to start _moving_ and all of a sudden Ze understood how the imposters had managed to escape being caught. They were _fast_. His arm was bleeding a ludicrous amount, and the pain was starting to blacken the edges of his vision, but all he could really think about was that Chilled was holding him like he was a gosh-darn pretty princess or some shit.

And it was kind of nice. Maybe.

He was still sorting through his exact thoughts on it when suddenly light was streaming in from above and he was pushed out of the vent and onto the floor of the medbay. It was around there that he passed out to Chilled yelling at him.

"Ze? Ze, fucking open your eyes come on, buddy. Oh shit. Shit—"

When he came to again, he was surrounded with bloody towels and Corpse was rifling through a cabinet in front of him. He felt lightheaded, and kind of loopy. He was also in a fuck ton of pain. Leave it to good 'ol Sykkuno though to save the day with rudimentary medical skills.

"Chilled was pretty mad," he mumbled after the green crewmate had bandaged him up. Corpse gave him a small hum that kind of screamed _that's the understatement of the year_ and Ze was pretty sure he was more scared of Chilled's wrath than of bleeding out.

* * *

Chilled was, in fact, very upset.

They ate dinner that night in medbay together. Chilled sat at the foot of the bed and Ze silently delighted in the reversal of their previous sleeping positions. Being spoon-fed (well, hand-fed, through the helmet's food receptacle) wasn't even so bad like that. His arm hurt a hell of a lot but Chilled being there at least took his mind off the pain for a bit.

"You better never get the _bright_ idea to go back down there. Do you have any idea how fucking fragile you are? Pretty sure breathing wrong could hurt you—" Chilled was ranting along, his glasses slipping down his nose to smoosh against his helmet visor, and Ze was pretty sure he was still doped up on pain medication because he was enjoying the shit out of Chilled's mother hen act.

He sat through the lecture for a few minutes, savoring his tasteless space food, before he cut in with a simple, "I'm going back into the vents as soon as I'm healed."

The incredulous look on Chilled face screamed _wow, he's a fucking idiot_ and _over my dead body_ in equal measure. Ze crossed his arms and raised a challenging eyebrow, "you can't stop me."

Chilled laughed one of his more unhinged laughs (Ze didn't know why those laughs were his favorite), "actually I very much can."

"But you won't," Ze pushed with a guileless smile.

Chilled stared at him. Stared really hard. Then he sighed—much like a parent with a particularly troublesome child—and leaned back on the bed.

"No, I guess I won't."

Ze narrowed his eyes, despite having known that Chilled would relent, "why? Corpse said you might chain me up under the navigation table. As a joke, obviously. But you could, in theory. Always have me at your beck and call, never have to worry about me getting into something I shouldn't." _Like a dog._ Ze didn't really know why he was saying these things. He blamed the pain meds. He also couldn't deny that he wanted to _know_ though and his undying curiosity had always been one of his more self-sabotaging traits.

Chilled considered him for a moment, a ghost of a wistful smile playing on his features, before he looked down at the bandage in his hands, "there's a reason I picked you. I don't want to destroy what made—what makes—you special." He dropped the gauze and his too-focused eyes settled on Ze's visor instead, "even your constant rebellions have their charm."

Something warm filled his blood and Ze sat up straighter in the bed. Was Chilled actually being honest for once? He couldn't pass the opportunity up so he asked, "what are people like on your planet? Are they like me?"

Chilled laughed again, "no. _No_. They're mostly like Corpse, stoic, but _actually_ stoic and not just faking it."

"Corpse fakes it?"

Chilled shrugged, "who knows what's an act with him. He's a ruthless killer, but an even better liar. I'm surprised I got any kills in at all with him as my partner."

Ze tried to hide his surprise. Corpse had always seemed like a pretty nice guy—a nice guy who just happened to be a murderous alien. Even after learning the truth, the black imposter had never really scared Ze. He seemed harmless, if not a little shy. Maybe that was all just an act. Ze swallowed, "what do you mean?"

Chilled smirked, and Ze saw a brief gleam of razor-sharp fangs behind his visor, "I mean, you should have seen what he did to the cyan crewmate. It was a fucking bloodbath. There's a reason why nobody was allowed in to check the body except Hafu. She was always good with blood."

Ze thought back and realized that he _had_ never seen Toast's body. Maybe there hadn't even been a body _to_ see. He suppressed a shiver that threatened to shake his entire body. Toast and Sykkuno had been best friends...until the cyan crewmate had been mysteriously murdered and Corpse seamlessly took his place.

"Does Sykkuno know?"

"Probably only what Corpse wants him to," Chilled shrugged, "I mean, that level of gore is looked down upon even by our people. We prefer clean kills. Corpse's one fault is that he's...messy. I'm not complaining though, I hardly had to do anything."

"Why shouldn't I go and tell Sykkuno the truth?"

"You could, but I don't think you'd want to. Sykkuno needs Corpse, so there's no point in making it harder for them to reconcile."

"Just like I _need_ you?" Ze nearly spat the word.

Chilled tilted his head in contemplation. Finally, he just said, "yeah. You do need me."

And if there was _one_ certain way to piss Ze off, it was by implying that he wasn't as independent as he thought.

He threw his covers off with a snarl—flinging the food bags and supplies onto the ground—and lunged at Chilled. He knew he wasn't as strong as the imposter, but he _also_ had the advantage of having hidden a scalpel from the cupboards under his pillow. His paranoia just constantly came in handy, didn't it?

His movements weren't elegant in any shape or form (his dominant hand was out of commission after all), but he wrestled Chilled onto the mattress under threat of the scalpel pressed to the thin fabric of the suit at his neck.

The imposter's eyebrows rose but he didn't look particularly scared either, which just made Ze's blood boil more.

"I. Don't. Need. Anybody." Ze snarled lowly, pressing the blade harder against the suit with every word, "especially not you"

Chilled was still beneath him, all except for his mouth, which was _never_ quiet for too long, "as much as you might hate it, you _do_ need me if you want to survive."

"I could kill you and then kill myself," Ze breathed out in a rush, his brain going off like a hundred explosions. He felt strangely _alive_ , ironically enough. "Rather that then be dependent like some kind of pet."

"You could." It was oddly challenging, which just made Ze's elation rise.

"I _could._ Would you let me?" Ze whispered, pulling Chilled up by the front of his astronaut suit, and he didn't miss how Chilled shivered beneath him.

The imposter tensed for a moment but then went lax again on the bed, "I don't know. Maybe."

They stared at each other. Ze shifted the scalpel slightly, searching the other's face for fear. He found none. Only a cold, sharp stare that lit him up inside.

He pressed just a _bit_ harder, and saw the suit cleanly slice open, exposing a sliver of skin along Chilled's neck. The sight alone made him go dizzy with a sense of power, and he had to close his eyes and take a deep breath before he could look down again.

If Chilled were a crewmate, he'd be gasping by now. Oxygen on the ship was scarce, and something as small as a helmet crack could become potentially life threatening. It was honestly lucky that Ze had only torn his suit the other day on his arm, which was insulated and nowhere near to where an oxygen tube provided his helmet with breathable air.

"I _knew_ that imposters don't need oxygen to live," Ze murmured, "that's why you fucks didn't care about sabotaging the tank."

Chilled broke into a deranged grin, "you were certain enough that you'd bet my life on it?"

"I almost always am," he grinned back, just as viciously.

"Goes to show that you're even crazier than I am." The imposter sounded a little proud.

Ze was feeling a little bit proud of himself right then too. Also a bit dizzy. Very dizzy, actually.

Fuck.

He all but collapsed on top of Chilled and the imposter caught his heavy body and hauled him right back up. Ze's head lulled on the imposter's shoulder as he was manhandled back into a sitting position. Even his fingers were refusing to move right.

Ze looked down and watched Chilled finish slowly pushing a syringe of _something_ into the numb skin of his arm. Oh, so _that's_ why he was dizzy. Fucking imposter. First sabotaging the lights, and now his body.

"Fuck you." Ze slurred and the imposter rolled his eyes. Chilled pulled the syringe out and gave the area a little pat before he placed the shot back on the side table and let Ze's heavy body collapse against the pillows.

"As much as I admire the dedication you have to proving your theories, I'm afraid it'd be negligent to let you continue in, uh," Chilled motioned to Ze's entire body, "this state."

Ze glared at him the best he could, which, admittedly, wasn't very fear-inducing. He could hardly keep his eyes open. As the world started to slip into darkness, he felt the bed dip at his feet, and knew that Chilled would be there.

And it was still comforting, sleeping next to a killer.

* * *

"I can't believe you drugged me."

" _I_ can't believe you sliced open my suit!"

"Shut the fuck up, you don't even need it to live. You don't breathe oxygen, remember alien boy?"

"Well what if I _did_ , huh? Ever think of that?"

Ze rolled his eyes, "I _guess_ if I had been wrong I would've given you CPR or some shit."

"Oh yeah, _real_ smart. Take off _both_ our helmets why don't you and we'll just Romeo and Juliet it up out here. Not to mention the radiatio—"

"The hell. You've read Shakespeare?"

"No. But I know the basic premise of the play, Ze."

"Huh," Ze paused their back-and-forth as Chilled fed him another chunk of nondescript space food since Ze's arm was still healing. He chewed thoughtfully and stared across the table to where Corpse and Sykkuno were seated together again just like old times. _Looks like they made up._

He noticed the green crewmate's hand was securely wrapped around Corpse's under the table.

 _Looks like they_ more _than made up._

Ze raised an eyebrow. He wasn't sure what to make of Sykkuno and Corpse being close again after what he'd learned about the black imposter. Sykkuno was so _good_ —honestly, he was far too innocent and naive in Ze's humble opinion—but maybe that's what had drawn the murderous killer to the green crewmate in the first place. _Opposites attract_ , and all of that.

Ze was pretty sure he and Chilled were two sides of the same coin. Similar enough to be nigh indistinguishable.

He side-eyed the white imposter and felt a familiar warmth rise up his chest. That strange reaction had been happening since the start. Since the first fucking time he'd laid eyes on Chilled in the lobby of the MIRA headquarters.

If they were so similar

then why did he always feel a pull?

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If I can think of a good direction to continue in, I'll maybe add more in the future since I'm kind of loving these twisted pairings.


	4. The Crewmates

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Corpse doesn't understand humans.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Note:** This chapter has some more mature themes.

_[[♪](https://youtu.be/p3EHSBZTJ9E)]_

Corpse wasn't okay.

To be honest, he probably hadn't been okay for a very long time. Infiltrating the Skeld had been easy enough, as was completing their objective of killing (almost) everyone on-board. Killing was easy in general. All he had to do was close his eyes and extend his fangs and in a matter of seconds it was done. For how long it took to make a functioning person, they were sure easy to dispose of.

Corpse was baffled that a creature with so few built-in defense measures had survived long enough to become spacefaring. Evolution worked in truly mysterious ways.

Honestly, it was _boring._ Sometimes he changed it up a bit—tried to get a little artistic with it—but that just had Chilled giving him side-eyes and Corpse didn't want to get them any points deducted when they arrived back on their planet. He'd cleaned his messier kills up well enough, he thought. Well, some of Toast's blood _was_ still stuck to the ceiling of medbay, but he'd get around to that eventually. It wasn't even that noticeable.

Chilled was just a perfectionist about that kind of thing. Always so focused on the _right_ way stuff should be done. For someone who hated authority, he sure was all for rules. Corpse didn't know how someone could live with the monotony of just silently slicing someone in half and being done with it. Where was the fun in that?

There was none, Corpse had tried it.

And tried it.

And tried it.

_And tried it._

Okay, so maybe he should have told Chilled that this wasn't his first rodeo, but that also didn't seem very fun.

Corpse glanced out at the starfields behind the navigation panel. Space was relaxing. Empty. So completely different from the bustling, monstrous structures that crowded his planet. He didn't want to go back; he hadn't wanted to last time either. He didn't fit in there.

It was amusing to him that he fit in better with _aliens_ than he did with his own kind. The poor humans had never even suspected him. Had accepted him so willingly.

They hadn't suspected him during his first trial either. That had been a good run. Well, the council disagreed with him there, but how was Corpse meant to know that being _too_ murderous was a bad thing in a trial all about murder? Yeah, so _maybe_ his partner had gotten a little traumatized, maybe they'd been upset about him killing their prizes, but that was hardly his fault. The trial was _meant_ to be hard, right? Why else have one in the first place. And the aliens they captured as trophies usually died within the first few months anyway. They were a colossal waste of time and had so many annoying needs on top of that (oxygen, weekly food, clean water).

Whatever, it had worked out in the end. Being sent on a redemption trial was hardly a punishment.

He'd been a little cleaner this time though, just because the council might _actually_ punish him if he made the same mistakes twice.

Well, for the _most part_ he'd been good. The crewmate Toast had been an exception, but he'd also been an exception in another way as well: he'd had something Corpse wanted. Killing him had been a true treat. It wasn't often that kills made him feel anything these days. The ones that did were special, and deserved a little extra flare.

Not only had killing him been fun, but it had also practically dumped Sykkuno into his arms afterwards.

Corpse had chosen the green crewmate as his trophy on the first day of their trip. It'd just seemed like the obvious choice. Sykkuno was timid, polite, well-behaved. He probably wouldn't kick up too much of a fuss after things were revealed, and maybe he'd even give Corpse the space he needed to not want to tear his little green suit to shreds.

Plus, it was obvious the crewmate was enamored with him, which made him all the more easy to manipulate. _Love is blind_ , and all that.

Corpse didn't understand the feeling, but he knew what the signs were. He'd learned about it in the classes he'd taken that had prepared him for the trial. Love. An _emotion_ experienced by humans.

"Love? Like feeling hungry?" One of his peers had asked and their teacher had shaken her head. "No, but similar. The closest thing we can compare it to is the rush of the hunt we get during the trials. We'll learn how to fake human emotions in the next class." Corpse aced that class and even learned some human courting customs that had helped him gain Sykkuno's favor.

Emotions like love were an ungraspable concept, which made them curious to Corpse.

Chilled, for his part, was very in-tune with human emotions. Almost too in-tune, which was probably why he was on a ship with an unpredictable flunky like Corpse. Being _too_ interested in humans tended not to be a good look. Plus, Chilled acted so human that even Corpse had on more than one occasion almost sunk his fangs into the other's neck after seeing the white imposter _laugh_. Nobody laughed on their planet.

Evidently they both had their peculiarities. As long as Chilled didn't get in his way and let him kill his fill, Corpse didn't give a damn either. If Chilled wanted to play human with his prize then that was his prerogative. As for himself, Corpse let Sykkuno do he wanted for the most part. As long as he could show the green crewmate to the council wholly intact— _not_ torn to shreds—then that was all that mattered. In the meantime, he played nice and let Sykkuno hold his hand when they walked around, smiled when the other talked about one pointless thing or another during meals, and did his best to make sure the crewmate didn't try to fling his squishy body down a vent again.

Corpse raised a hand to his helmet and held it to where his cheek had smacked the glass a few days ago when Sykkuno had pushed him against the reactor. That had been wholly unexpected. More unexpected though was the fact that he hadn't just decided to cut his loses and end the human's life right then and there. In the past he'd killed people over less; actually, he'd repeatedly killed crewmates for doing absolutely nothing at all. Maybe Chilled was rubbing off on him.

And maybe his little green human wasn't as tame as he'd first seemed.

Corpse found he didn't care that much. Some on his planet liked to tediously train their prizes and parade them around the streets all docile. Used them as servants around their nests. Corpse had no idea what he was going to do with Sykkuno; his nest was neither big nor messy. He wasn't sure if he could trust Sykkuno enough to bring him into work either. All his superiors had humans but it also wasn't uncommon for...incidents to happen.

And if Corpse was taking the time and effort to bring Sykkuno all the way back home—and go through the trouble of buying tanks of oxygen—then he wasn't going to let anything happen to his human. He supposed just keeping the human around provided him with some much-needed entertainment.

Corpse looked up at a quiet knock on the doorway frame.

Sykkuno was standing in the entryway, his hands clasped nervously in the hems of his suit, "hi uh, am I interrupting you from doing...navigating?"

Corpse shook his head, carefully pulling on his human act again, "no, it's okay. I'm just making sure we don't run into any astroid fields. You can sit with me if you want."

The green crewmate's face broke out into a smile at that and he shuffled over to the navigation panel, pulling out the chair next to Corpse's that Chilled usually sat in. His feet dangled a bit above the floor and Corpse was fascinated by his _smallness_ again.

"Chilled said that we're getting close to your home planet."

There was something different about the human's voice and Corpse tried to identify what it was. There were so _many_ human emotions and some of the tells were so subtle as to be nigh indistinguishable from the norm. Was the human scared? Sad? Happy? Corpse decided to respond with a safe, "yes. We should land in a few days."

Sykkuno rested his chin on his folded arms and gazed out the large window, stars reflecting in his visor, "what's it— what's it like there? Where you come from."

Corpse considered lying but decided there was little point, "crowded. Cold. I have a nest in the grassland, where it's more isolated."

Sykkuno tilted his head, "a nest?"

Corpse just nodded and quietly adjusted the ship's trajectory a little to the right. He didn't really understand why the human was asking obvious questions.

The crewmate was persistent though, "what do you do? Like are there jobs or...uhm. Do you...?" Sykkuno trailed off nervously and Corpse internally sighed. Humans were so personal. They were irrationally invested in the wellbeing and internal affairs of others, for whatever reason. Corpse forced himself to summon some patience.

"Our concept of work differs from yours. There's a hierarchy. Based on our age, we are assigned to different tasks. Upon completing The Trial, most of us become mentors to those who must complete The Trial in the next season. What we teach is determined by what we excelled at during our own trial."

"Oh?" Sykkuno leaned forward a little, "do you know what you're going to teach?"

Corpse did, in fact, know. He'd been told after his last trial that he'd teach meeting strategies and how to blend in. AKA: How To Lie Convincingly. A coveted class to teach. At least the council had praised him on his ability to remain undetected. _If only your kills were as neat as your evasions,_ one of the councilmen had quipped.

"That hasn't been determined yet."

The green crewmate nodded to himself a little and then turned around in his chair to face Corpse. He wanted something, Corpse could tell that much. He just couldn't figure out _what_. Was the human hungry? Lonely? Sick? Corpse kept his gaze forward on the empty stretch of space outside the window, hoping that the crewmate would get bored and stop looking at him like that. He wasn't good with being stared at.

"Ze said that imposters don't need oxygen to breathe. That you can take off your helmets. And it got me thinking that I've never actually seen your um," Sykkuno's voice got quiet then but Corpse still heard, "face. Or you in your uhm, imposter form? Your fangs?"

Corpse stopped trying to avoid eye-contact and turned around in his seat at that, flicking on the auto pilot. He considered the small crewmate, "you want to see them?"

Sykkuno hesitated for a second before his eyes got that strange, determined look in them again and he nodded firmly.

The imposter thought the request over. What was the harm in showing the human? Well, Sykkuno _could_ get scared and become evasive like Chilled's human. That would certainly be an annoyance. Then again, the last time his human had looked like that, Corpse had gotten cornered and manhandled, so perhaps this was the human's so-called "brave" face (bravery was another strange, human concept). He was somewhat intrigued.

Would his fangs be appalling? Terrifying? Fascinating?

Corpse reached up and started to undo the latches on the sides of his helmet. Apparently Sykkuno hadn't expected him to actually agree, because his eyes went wide and he started saying a whole bunch of things while never actually finishing any of the thoughts. His face flushed red as Corpse removed his helmet and placed it on the dashboard, and Corpse had always thought it was odd how human skin changed colors like that. It seemed like an utterly useless feature.

A small gasp escaped Sykkuno's mouth and he stared up at Corpse wonderingly, like the stars were in his eyes and not outside the ship. The gaze made Corpse feel pinned down, strangely...vulnerable. He hadn't even shown his fangs yet, so why was the human gawking at him? He was about to open his maw when a gloved hand landed on the side of his face, reverent and soft to the touch. The contact was barely there, but it still made Corpse freeze.

"You're so pretty," Sykkuno whispered, his eyes roaming Corpse's face, "I mean uhm, handsome? Both." His fingers brushed over the bare cheek and Corpse flinched, his body not used to another's touch. It was taking every bit of self-control he had not to lash out.

Corpse stared at Sykkuno, non-comprehending. What was so interesting to the human about how his face looked? It was just skin. Maybe he hadn't morphed it correctly? No, the human seemed pleased. Maybe he'd done a good job at shapeshifting into a human then. He swallowed and then took ahold of Sykkuno's too-gentle hand and drew it away. His face was a vulnerable area and he didn't trust anyone that close to it.

Another blush, "oh! Sorry I— I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable."

"I wasn't." Lie. "I'm just not used to it." Truth.

Sykkuno's fingers slid between Corpse's own, a familiar, safe point of contact, "ok. I'm ready to see your fangs. Er, if you still want to show me."

It felt strangely like their roles had somehow reversed. He, the hunter, was now prey to Sykkuno's adoring gaze. His fight or flight instincts were going off. Off-balance, Corpse just nodded again and contemplated how he should show off his fangs. Usually, he killed by morphing a second maw in his throat, since it was easy to just lift up his helmet, kill, and then pop it back on again afterwards.

So that's what he did.

He tilted his head back and slowly let his throat gape open into a cavernous mouth filled with rows of deadly fangs and a coiling, sharp tongue.

Immediately, the blood left Sykkuno's face. He looked pale behind his visor all of a sudden and Corpse began to regret giving in to his trophy's request. Corpse didn't even know exactly why he'd agreed in the first place. It wasn't like he had anything to gain but the human's approval. Well, Corpse _had_ been curious. The result was...unsatisfying. Although he didn't really know why.

Sykkuno took a shuddering breath, and then another, and Corpse started to seal his maw since it was obviously frightening the human.

"Don't!" Sykkuno yelled, slightly hysterical, and Corpse froze. "Just— Just give me a second."

Corpse wondered if Sykkuno would start hyperventilating and tried to recall the particularly short lesson he'd had on human mental heath. It wasn't like he'd been taught much about how to _help_ humans. The human rocked on his chair for a second, his eyes closed, and then opened them again. The green crewmate's gloved hand came back up and he tentatively reached to touch one of Corpse's fangs with a trembling hand.

Corpse pulled away—not sure if he trusted his _own_ instincts not to bite the offending fingers off—and the action made Sykkuno jerk his hand back as well. They stared at each other, a little wild-eyed, and Corpse melded the skin on his throat together under Sykkuno's fascinated (horrified?) gaze.

"It's a lot," Corpse said, mostly just to end the whole conversation. He covered his face back up with his dark helmet and was somewhat comforted by the barrier it created.

"Is this your original form?"

"No." He didn't think a human would be able to handle something like that. Not yet. Maybe once he'd been introduced to the colorful array of bodies and shapes the others of his kind used.

Sykkuno whispered "oh" and stared at his feet.

 _Oh_ indeed.

* * *

Sykkuno was a little skittish after their encounter in navigation, but he still sat by Corpse at dinner and spent odd hours following him around like a lost puppy. Ze and Chilled had started spending most of their days together, exploring the vents or making a ruckus in some room or another, so that usually left Corpse alone in navigation.

Corpse had to suppress a shiver sometimes at the way Chilled was acting so extraordinarily _human_ these days. His smiles and elation almost seemed genuine, which was nothing short of utterly baffling. Corpse was almost worried that they'd lose points with the council for treating their prizes too _well_ this time around.

It all came to a head one day when he and Sykkuno walked into medbay together to pick up some supplies and found Chilled and Ze already there. Nothing new. What _was_ new was that the red crewmate was straddling the white imposter's lap and had one hand under his suit while the other was curled around the front of the imposter's throat. Chilled's helmet had been discarded on the floor.

"O-Oh my gosh! Sorry!" Sykkuno yelped, covering his eyes and spinning around, his face bright red. Corpse just stared at how Ze's fingers were pressed against the other imposter's neck and wondered if they'd just walked into a murder attempt. Why was his human acting so strange? Was it impolite to watch a murder? Why wasn't Chilled fighting back? He put down the box he'd been carrying and looked towards Chilled to see if the other imposter needed help.

Said other imposter adverted his gaze.

Strange.

Ze quickly disentangled himself from Chilled with a prominent blush of his own, "god! Fucking, Chilled I thought you locked the doors."

Chilled sighed long-sufferingly and propped himself up on his elbows, "you do realize they can open doors, right? It's not like we dead-bolted it. Plus I wasn't really..." _Paying attention to that._

Corpse continued to stare, not understanding what they'd stumbled in on. Had Ze not been strangling Chilled? What the actual fuck was going on. He felt a tug at his sleeve and looked down to see Sykkuno still turned away, trying to drag him out of the room. With a final glance towards Chilled, he allowed his human to pull him back into the hallway. The doors slammed shut behind them.

"Why did we leave? We still need to pick up the oxygen tanks." Corpse tilted his head.

Sykkuno gaped at him, his cheeks still pink, "they were— uhm! _You know._ "

Corpse did not know. "What."

Sykkuno made a pitiful little sound and dragged his hands down his face, "oh my gosh. Uh." He peeked out from between his fingers, "do you guys not usually...kiss? Or do stuff like that?"

"Kiss?" Corpse vaguely remembered hearing the term but it obviously hadn't been very important because he couldn't recall its meaning. Sykkuno frowned and Corpse wondered if he'd said the wrong thing. Maybe he should have just pretended to know.

"It's when two people press their lips together and it, uhm, feels good? I-I wouldn't know. Obviously humans can't kiss in space, but they can still do..." Sykkuno fidgeted and looked away, "I guess other things."

Corpse stared at him silently. Another strange human custom. He wondered why Chilled was going along with it and giving Ze prime opportunity to murder him. His imposter partner obviously had a few screws loose. Which was nothing he hadn't already known.

"I see," he said and frowned at the fact that they hadn't been able to collect the supplies they needed. Typical. He was about to start walking back towards electrical when Sykkuno's hand found his sleeve again.

"We— uhm." The human obviously wanted to continue the conversation but was too embarrassed to. Corpse waited patiently for the little crewmate to finish collecting his thoughts. He'd found that rushing the other just made his sentences even harder to decipher. "We could too. If you're ever curious." The words came out in a rush.

Corpse had no idea what the significance of the act was, or why it made the human so nervous. Honestly the whole situation was starting to get on his nerves, "alright." And then because it seemed important to the human, he added, "thank you, Sykkuno."

A shy, soft smile broke across Sykkuno's face and the human slotted their fingers together again. _Holding hands,_ the human called it.

Corpse adjusted the grip slightly, gave a small smile back, and then walked side-by-side to electrical with his little human.

* * *

_[[♪](https://youtu.be/SSWf8qMmCPk)]_

The human was persistent.

He was also shy.

It was somewhat entertaining, watching Sykkuno try to be subtle and direct all at once. Of course Corpse noticed how the crewmate's touches lingered. His body was hyper-aware of any threats, and his species didn't let their _own_ kind touch them generally, much less an alien. Still, Corpse had decided that he'd put up with the human's tactile needs.

Which was why Sykkuno's head was resting on his lap as Corpse fiddled with some box wiring. He'd been making portable lights for the humans to use in the vents at Chilled's request. (Really they were only for Ze, as Corpse didn't allow Sykkuno to go down the vents at all.) He couldn't imagine that his lap was particularly comfortable with his crinkly astronaut suit covering it, but the human seemed content and comfortable enough, quietly reading a book they'd found in storage.

Eventually, Sykkuno rested the book open-faced on the floor. With a quiet yawn, he turned on his side and closed his eyes, his helmet smooshed right up against Corpse's thigh. A few minutes later his breathes were even and deep, his face relaxed and soft with sleep.

Corpse paid little mind and continue to fiddle with some stubborn wires.

It wasn't until he finished that he really looked down and took in the reality of a human currently making his lap an impromptu bed. He considered waking Sykkuno up but decided not to. He wasn't sure why, but it seemed unwise to disturb the little creature. There wasn't a whole lot to do, however, with the weight on his lap keeping him in place.

He looked around restlessly for a minute before his eyes landed on Sykkuno's profile and stayed there.

Humans really did look defenseless. Even more so when they slept.

All things considered, Corpse thought he'd been doing a good job at keeping Sykkuno safe and healthy. The human had even been smiling more recently, which was an indicator of a human's wellbeing. Mostly out of curiosity, the imposter carefully rested his hand on Sykkuno's back, in-between his shoulder blades.

Even through the suit, Corpse could feel the steady, soft _thump_ of the human's singular heart. In their lessons they'd learned about human anatomy—mostly how to dismember said anatomy—but the fact that humans only had one heart had always seemed stupid to Corpse. If it failed...the whole human failed. No fail-safes.

Weak, pitiful.

In need of protection.

Corpse kept his hand pressed there for another few minutes, just feeling the perilous life under his palm. Then he moved his hand down the crewmate's back, feeling out the small bumps of his spine. He traced over ribs, between shoulder blades. It wasn't until Sykkuno giggled when he reached the human's sides that he realized the other had woken up.

He stopped his movements but Sykkuno just wrapped his arms around Corpse's waist and buried his head closer, "it feels good."

Corpse hesitated for a second before he slid his hand down the back lying in front of him. He continued his exploration of the human's bones, feeling each one out under the thin astronaut suit. _Clavicle, scapula, floating ribs. T1..T2...T3._

Sykkuno smiled the whole time, his eyes shut and his body relaxed as Corpse did his thing. It wasn't until Corpse reached the last rung of vertebrae that the human shifted, his eyes cracking open to look up at Corpse somewhat curiously. Maybe that area was sensitive. Corpse backtracked and traced up the human's spine again, feeling his finger dip and rise with every bump.

Sykkuno turned so that he was looking up at Corpse and the imposter wasn't sure what he was meant to do, so he just let his hand fall back to the floor.

It was Sykkuno who reached out then, extending his hand to ever-so-softly touch the cloth covering Corpse's neck. Like a knife made of air, he drew his finger across where Corpse had opened his maw for him before.

"You're so gentle with me," the human whispered, "even after seeing your monster I don't...really see it. It doesn't seem real. Does that make sense?"

No. "Maybe," Corpse lied. It didn't feel right though. "I don't know."

Sykkuno's eyes were crystalline, too bright, "I mean, you're not a monster to me. You wouldn't hurt me on purpose."

"I promised I wouldn't." Truth. If he'd wanted to kill the human, he would have done so already. The council was of little concern anymore. Corpse had spent too much time with the human, made their talks a habit, grown used to the tiny hand in his own. Now he'd lose a piece of his day if Sykkuno died. There would be a hole just the right size for the green crewmate to slot into.

Sykkuno's answering smile was soft, just the barest hint of happiness rounding out his face, but it felt strangely like it was the first real one Corpse had ever been given. He pressed his hand to the glass of Sykkuno's visor and suddenly the concept of kissing made a little more sense. He wanted to touch Sykkuno's face, feel the softness he knew lay beneath the helmet with no barriers, feel his tiny bones and fluttering heart up close.

Bloodlust?

Corpse frowned and pulled back, confused by the conflicting instincts rising up inside of him. He felt elated, like he was on a hunt; he felt vulnerable, scared that something or someone would harm the delicate creature in front of him. Strange. It was all so strange. Something was _wrong_ , and he wasn't okay at all anymore. 

Sykkuno followed him, sitting up on his knees as he came face-to-face with the imposter.

Like this, the green crewmate was slightly taller, covering Corpse in a personal shadow. This time when the crewmate pressed a hand against the side of Corpse's helmet, the imposter didn't move. All three of his hearts stuttered out of sync. 

A thought popped into Corpse's head: what if he hadn't been the one doing the taming? What if he'd been the feral pet all along, slowly being acclimated to a human's touch? 

He blinked up at Sykkuno's face

and finally understood how humans had survived for so long.

> _Because freedom, I am told, is nothing but the distance between the hunter and its prey._
> 
> — Ocean Vuong

* * *


	5. The Humans

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chilled loves humans. He loves Ze the most though.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Note:** This chapter has sexual situations in it but the acts themselves aren't explicit. I'd say this chapter borders on a mature rating.

Chilled was in love.

At least, he was pretty sure he was. What else could the warm, ravenous hunger clawing at the inside of his chest be? In all the human literature he'd read over the years, love had always been depicted as an all-consuming need—it was sustenance—and that was precisely what he felt. Of course, he knew his love was surely lacking—perhaps the hunger a little _too_ literal—but love wasn't supposed to be perfect. It was just supposed to _be_.

Humans weren't as caught up in perfection, not like his own society was. He'd always been fascinated by their culture.

And Ze encapsulated everything that fascinated him about it.

The red crewmate was refreshingly loud, inordinately rash, beautifully emotive, and sensitive to the boot. So many wonderfully explosive emotions bundled up into one small human-shaped package. Being near the man was like camping next to a roaring fire; sparks flew off and hit him sometimes, but the heat was more than worth it.

Corpse would probably toss him out the airlock if he knew what Chilled thought of Ze.

Most of their kind didn't have the same...interest in humans that Chilled did. In fact, most found the squishy, little creatures to be downright pathetic. Only good for being kept like stock.

Of course, hidden on the frays of society, there were others like Chilled. A few. Well, more like a couple. Chilled only knew of one who was like him personally. It wasn't like it was easy to find others with a similar admiration for humans in a society that systematically hunted said humans. He'd met Yeti in one of his classes, where the older imposter had been teaching advanced task faking. It wasn't until they'd gotten to know each other better that Chilled had met Yeti's human, 5up. Yeti was very careful about who met his human, which was different from the way most prizes were paraded about openly in public.

5up was nothing like what Chilled had come to expect. Instead of being silent and skittish, 5up was talkative and opinionated. Smart. He actively talked back to Yeti and he did it with a _smile_. Yeti didn't seem to mind either, treating the challenges like one from an equal more than one from a possession. The way they interacted was so different, unlike anything Chilled had ever seen. Suddenly the human literature he'd read made more sense. Relationships, deep connections between living beings, weren't just fantasy; they could be a reality. In a society void of inter-personal relationships, Chilled found solace in the lone human and his books.

He never did learn the whole story, but Chilled heard rumors that something terrible had happened during Yeti's trial. Nobody seemed to agree on exactly what though—only that his imposter partner had died, and was found dismembered—and Chilled certainly wasn't going to ask. He had a suspicion that 5up had done it though. Or maybe he'd made Yeti do it, to prove his loyalty—a twisted tit for tat. Over time, Chilled learned more and more about the human dressed innocuously in a pink spacesuit. Eventually, they even became friends.

> **Friend**
> 
> _ /frɛnd/ _
> 
> A person with whom one has a bond of mutual affection, typically one exclusive of sexual or family relations.

Family? Sex? There was so much to learn.

Chilled read every piece of human literature he could. Read tales of royalty and dragons and love. So much love. The feeling was surprisingly prevalent. Page after page filled with bountiful descriptions of it. So much time and detail was put into trying to explain one emotion, and yet Chilled couldn't understand it. Not really.

"Do you love Yeti?" Chilled had asked 5up once and the human had chuckled. Even his laughs sounded calm and even. "Wish I didn't sometimes," he said with a subtle smile, "but the fact that he's alive proves that I do."

When he asked Yeti the same question later, he'd just got a quiet but firm "yes" in response.

They were in love! Their connection was incredible to Chilled. Inconceivable, yes, but so utterly fascinating that he became a little enamored by the mere idea of it. He wanted to find it one day; wanted to feel it. Go against his anatomy, his society, and find the source of happiness written about in all the books he read.

As his Trial drew near, Chilled was torn between excitement and fear.

He would get to see humans up close, get to talk to them and try to understand them. He was also supposed to _kill_ them though, and the prospect of that didn't seem nearly as fulfilling as it had in the past. Why destroy a life with so much potential, so much intrigue swirling under the surface?

The day came.

He carefully crafted his human form, met Corpse—who made all of Chilled's self-defense instincts light up—and together they infiltrated their designated MIRA base.

And he did his best not to think about how all of the crewmates looked a little like the pink human he knew from back on his planet.

* * *

_[[♪](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_P8oKrQV52I&ab_channel=AnythingButCountry)]_

He tried his best to keep a low profile and just watch. Much like one of the brave explorers in the books he'd read, jotting down points of intrigue about local customs in a far-off land. Corpse seemed more than happy to do all the killing anyway, which Chilled was grateful for. They met up and briefly discussed who they both wanted to keep alive after the first couple of days. Corpse wanted green, Chilled wanted red.

Chilled liked Red. He was always laughing and had a loud, clear voice. He later learned the human's name was Ze. Things were peaceful for the first week—they had to get a good ways away from any other human-inhabited areas before they could start killing—and Chilled was having the best time of his life.

Then one day he slipped into medbay to meet with Corpse at their usual meeting spot and walked directly into a puddle of blood. For the first time in his life, Chilled felt a sliver of _fear_ as he looked at the black shadow of Corpse standing, menacingly, with a gaping carcass dangling from his hands. A shiny row of ribs were exposed and gleaming in the flickering lights, and Chilled stumbled backwards, catching the wall. It was hard to identify which crewmate had even died through all the blood.

Corpse turned around slowly, the front of his suit soaked in blood, and he dropped the chunks of flesh he'd had in his hand to the ground. He seemed dazed, almost. Swaying.

Chilled swallowed, grabbing ahold of his nerves, and glanced out into the hallway. It was only a matter of time before someone came by and discovered the two of them just standing there. Thinking fast, he slammed the doors shut and grabbed Corpse's hand, dragging the other imposter towards the back where the vents were. Corpse made a low, growling sound at being taken from his prey but eventually let Chilled prod him down.

He slid the metal top shut and panted as his pupils expanded for night-vision.

"What the hell?" He seethed, feeling a very real threat of _hysteria_ , which was far too human of an emotion for him to have right then. Not when he was holding the hand of a literal man-slaughterer. _Okay, calm down Chilled. You're a murderer too. Stop freaking out._ "Why did you turn the medbay into a blood bath? We're supposed to dispose of them, not dismember them."

Corpse just silently regarded him for a second before he glanced down at the gore dripping from his suit. With a sigh, the black imposter turned around and trekked bloody footsteps all the way to the box they kept extra suits and helmets in. Chilled just stared. The word _monster_ came to mind. He had to remind himself that he was a monster too, to humans.

At dinner that evening nobody spoke. A tense silence had settled over the whole room. It'd been obvious that Toast had been brutally murdered. But by who? By what? The humans were curious and afraid. Chilled wished he hadn't stumbled in on his partner literally pulling the crewmate apart, because he couldn't help but feel a little afraid too.

Corpse just silently sat in his chair, a heavy hand on Sykkuno's helmet as the crewmate cried, and Chilled wondered if maybe he'd been better off feeling nothing at all.

* * *

He didn't want to kill humans.

But, of course, he couldn't get away with just playing crewmate forever.

The moment itself was silly, almost. Chilled had been meeting up with Corpse in the vents and he exited into the navigation room...just as Hafu walked in. Fuck.

Chilled saw the exact moment that horrified understanding lit up her eyes. She was so smart; she instantly put two and two together. Chilled _knew_ that she would tell if he let her leave. For a moment he considered letting her go, letting her run to the cafeteria and alert everyone, but then Corpse would be left alone and Ze would be killed like everyone else. Only one prize per imposter, after all. He lunged at her just as she was spinning around and without thinking twice he dragged her into the vent. She kicked and screamed but he was too strong and easily carried her through the narrow tunnel of steel. He had to find Corpse.

He found Corpse right where he'd left him. The other imposter looked up and then jolted to his feet at the sight of Hafu.

"What—"

"Just. Do it." Chilled gritted and shoved Hafu towards Corpse. The other imposter caught her and gave him a level stare—judging, Chilled was sure—but then just nodded.

Chilled closed his eyes, his hearts pounding too fast like they were going to fail him, and he didn't open them again until he heard the sickening _crunch_ of a neck snapping.

He felt dizzy at the sound and—without looking back—he ran down the corridor, bile rising up his throat. He threw off his helmet and held his gloved hand to his mouth. Shapeshifting to match a human's anatomy almost exactly had the pitfalls of also sharing some of their weaknesses. He waited for sick to come up but it never did and he was left pale and shaking.

He learnt that guilt was painful.

Like a dagger, it twisted his insides. Like an open gash, the feeling bled sluggishly for weeks.

* * *

Ze was like a beacon, bravely facing the murders on the Skeld instead of cowering away. He questioned everyone. Did detective work. Monitored the cams diligently.

Part of Chilled wanted the red crewmate to find out what they'd done. It'd be Just. Sometimes Chilled walked into navigation, where they'd left Hafu's body, and felt something profoundly empty well up inside of his chest. It'd been his fault. He'd gotten her killed. At those times he felt a wetness in his eyes that he only later identified as tears.

Maybe he'd become too human. Did all humans feel pain like this?

When Ze started trying to pin the murders on him, Chilled felt strangely elated. Relieved. The only problem was that nobody else believed him. (And, well, there was also the small issue that Chilled hadn't actually killed any of them. Not directly at least.) The true killer, Corpse, somehow managed to direct all the accusations away from the both of them subtly, flawlessly. The way Corpse spoke—calm and collected—was nothing like the wild beast Chilled had met in medbay.

Things didn't look too good for the crewmates, unfortunately.

* * *

The number of faces around the circular table slowly dwindled. It seemed fast though, like death was waiting at the calendar, hiding behind the dates. Chilled spent hours staring at the ceiling at night, hearing the soft-steady breathing of Ze lying at his feet.

Sometimes Ze would stay up too and they'd talk about anything that came to mind. Once they discussed animals; what kind they'd want to be, if they could be anything. The question seemed very silly to Chilled (who could _literally_ be anything he wanted), but he let the human pull him into the conversation anyway.

Ze's face lit up as he surely said, "I'd be a polar bear, pretty sure. Or a wolf. Something big and bad like that, ya'know?"

Chilled only vaguely remembered reading about those specific animals. Carnivores. It wasn't surprising to him that Ze had a fondness for apex predators.

The human was lying in bed with one, after all.

Chilled wondered if wolves felt remorse for the rabbits they slaughtered.

"I'd be myself," Chilled grinned, and Ze rolled his eyes with a huffed _narcissist._

* * *

Chilled hardly remembered The Day of Truth.

But he did remember the look Ze gave him and the way his tiny human heart skittered in his chest when Chilled pushed him into a wall. He remembered all the things Ze yelled at him.

He remembered that night. Ze faced away towards the wall. But the human also didn't move away when Chilled climbed into his usual spot. They turned off the lights and lay like that for hours, just listening to the sound of their breaths in the darkness.

After their meeting in the vents—and subsequent play with death in medbay—the crewmate seemed to become genuinely fond of him. Chilled wasn't sure exactly what had changed, but he also wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Sure, they still argued over silly things, but more often than not Chilled got the feeling that they were both having fun with it. Sometimes in the dark of their bunk, Ze would ask him more serious questions about him and his home planet. They fell back into their old habit of whispering together in the dark, conspiring, like jewel thieves planning a heist.

_How did The Trials start? How many ships are infiltrated by imposters per year? How old are you even? How do you—_

His ravenous curiosity was, as humans would say, _adorable_.

 _Adorable, cute, beautiful._ Human descriptors for things that weren't real. No, perhaps they were real, but a different kind of real. They were a reality that Chilled had to train himself to see. There was _beauty_ in the milky spirals of a galaxy, something _cute_ in the way Ze curled up on himself as he slept, mumbling nothings.

He was learning so much.

And he couldn't wait for Ze to meet 5up. For him to see that a human _could_ be happy on Chilled's home planet. That they had a bright future together, if the human wanted it. He smiled to himself and it broke out into a laugh when Ze shot him a suspicious look, "what?"

"Nothing, you're just over there grinning like some kinda weirdo," Ze chuckled, "what are you thinking about?"

"Just thinking about all the things I want to show you when we land. My nest, my—" Chilled hesitated for a second before he decided that 5up and Yeti were both his friends,"—friends, everything."

"Yeah?" The human finished putting away some filters into a medbay drawer and then turned towards him, an eyebrow raised.

"I think you'll like my friends. One of them is even a human like you."

Ze tilted his head, "are you friends with a lot of humans?"

"No, just him," Chilled straightened some pipe-cleaners and almost bumped into Ze when he turned around, somewhat surprised that he hadn't heard the human walk over.

"Am I your friend?" Ze's eyes were intense, dark. Chilled thought they were really _pretty_. Especially up close.

"Yes?" Chilled chanced, hoping that the human agreed with him. There was a beat of silence and then Ze's hand grabbed the front of Chilled's astronaut suit and pulled him down to eye-level.

"Is that all?" The human's words were quieter this time, but they felt louder.

 _All of what?_ Chilled wanted to ask but the words caught as Ze shoved him onto a medbay bed and crawled on top of him. Before Chilled could object, the human was fumbling with the latches on the side of the imposter's helmet and he all but threw it to the ground once he got it off.

Chilled stared at him, confused, before Ze grinned and wrapped his gloved hand around Chilled's neck.

Fuck.

The imposter felt himself shiver, memories of the last time he'd been pinned by the crewmate playing behind his eyelids. Humans were so warm; their heat leaked out even through the suits. He could feel each one of Ze's fingerpads pressed up against the delicate skin of his neck—digging in to restrict access to oxygen he didn't even need—and every one of his instincts was telling him to tear the smaller body on top of him apart. He could. Fuck, he could so easily. Ze knew he could too, but was _trusting_ him not to.

 _Something_ about that made Chilled's body light up.

 _Something_ was rising up inside of him; something hungry.

He growled and Ze just smirked, tightening his grip, "you said your kind don't like touching, but you don't seem to mind this that much. You could throw me off, right? Why don't you?"

Chilled wasn't sure how to respond. With the truth? He felt adrenaline flood his body; it obviously thought he was getting ready for a hunt. In his body's defense, it did somewhat feel like he was being hunted. In the end he said nothing and waited for Ze to tell him where he wanted to take the altercation. Ze huffed a laugh through his nose as he leaned down, the slick glass of his visor sliding cooly against Chilled's cheek. "Your body is almost perfectly modeled after a human's, right? Exactly _how_ similar is it? I know you can feel it when I touch you, but is it the same as what I'd feel?"

Another experiment? Chilled's hearts beat faster at the...the hunger underlying Ze's voice. He remembered scenes from the romance novels he'd read: a beautiful woman swept off her feet by a rough but good-natured knight, a princess pressing sensual kisses to her maid's hand behind the privacy of billowing curtains, a hero finding a burning longing inside his battle-hardened heart for his right-hand man. Was this what they'd been trying to describe? The tension, keeping Chilled restlessly still, hardly daring to breathe as he waited for what Ze would choose to do to him. He didn't know what he wanted, what he expected, but he knew that Ze would sate him. Would feed and nourish the need he'd never even knew he had.

The hand that wasn't wrapped around Chilled's throat dragged down the front of his suit and Chilled's eyes widened at the strange vulnerability the soft touch made him feel. Why did it feel—Chilled couldn't think of a fitting word—but it felt like _more_ somehow.

"Does your kind do this? Explore each other?" Ze's voice had a teasing edge to it but behind that the words were breathy.

"No," chilled whispered despite the lump in his throat.

Ze made a soft sound and slid his fingers up the sealed strip at the front of Chilled's suit, "should I teach you?"

There was nothing Chilled had ever wanted more. " _Yes._ "

Ze's face was a beautiful red, blotchy mess and he looked radiant even in the artificial lights. Chilled wanted to touch the human too, feel every inch of him, but he also didn't want to somehow change Ze's mind by doing the wrong thing. Human rituals could be strangely specific. So he stayed stock-still—like a live wire—and waited for Ze's fingers to show him what to do.

The human's breaths were loud, fogging up the inside of his visor, and his hands had a slight tremor to them as they slid open the airtight seal on the imposter's suit and then the zipper underneath. Chilled had a thin white shirt underneath the space suit and Ze rucked it up so that his stomach and chest were exposed.

"You like this," The fingers around his throat flexed slightly, as if making a point.

"It makes me feel human," Chilled responded, maybe a little too honestly. Ze's eyebrows rose but he didn't move away. Instead, his other hand pressed against the cool, exposed plane of Chilled's stomach.

It didn't feel like much of anything but vulnerability at first. Chilled was acutely aware of every point of contact between the two of them, hyper-focused on the rubbery texture of Ze's gloves dragging against his skin. Then Ze's fingers brushed over the soft, pink nubs on his chest and a shivery, sensitive feeling sparked from the area. Chilled winced at the sensation and gave the human a bewildered look, which was promptly met with a laugh.

"Yeah, that feeling's kind of hit or miss with some guys but..." Ze trailed his hand down between Chilled's legs and cupped him firmly over his suit, gently squeezing the area, "almost all of them like this."

A hazy, warm pleasure flooded Chilled's body, settling low in his stomach, and his eyes involuntarily shut. He sunk heavily into the pillow, lost in the overwhelming, new sensation. He'd never felt anything like it. It made his body feel heavy and weak at the same time. Ze's grip tightened and an involuntary sound escaped Chilled's mouth as he tilted his hips upwards into the touch, his body feeling a wave of what he could only assume was _pleasure._

Suddenly the human obsession with sex made a lot more sense.

When he opened his eyes again, he saw Ze staring at where his hand was touching the suit, his face completely flushed and his eyes hazy. With hunger. No, with _want_. Chilled finally linked the word and feeling together in his mind.

"Fuck, I wish I could—" The human stopped mid-sentence as a wordless sound left his throat. It was low and needy, and Chilled understood exactly how he felt. There weren't any fitting words to adequately describe the feeling. It was just there, flooding his body like it was trying to drown him in it.

A surge of _something_ was rising up inside of him and the force of it almost scared him. He blindly reached out to grab Ze—like holding onto him would somehow keep him grounded—and the crewmate slid a hand into his sweaty bangs and murmured reassurances.

"Just let it out, come on. You're so good, so good for me," the words all blurred together in Chilled's head as the feeling abruptly washed over him like a tidal wave, taking his thoughts away with it. He gasped and dug his nail's into Ze's back, his eyes prickling with wetness again at the _intensity_ of the feeling. He drifted in the feeling for who-knows-how-long before finally washing back up on the shore of awareness.

He blinked and Ze's smug-happy face came into view, "dang, now I kinda wish I could experience my first orgasm again."

"Did I just die?" Chilled blinked.

Ze laughed, "no, but it's not called _la petite mort_ for nothing. You should see your face."

Chilled narrowed his eyes but decided he was too tired to even continue talking. He felt _boneless_. In his exhausted state, he actually lost his grip on his transformation for a second and Ze yelled as his hand sunk into Chilled's stomach. Ah fuck.

In less than a second, he yanked out Ze's hand and corrected his human form with a half-hearted glare.

"Jesus— What the fuck!" Ze stared with morbid curiosity at the place his hand had just dipped into.

Chilled just groaned and turned over, pulling a pillow over his head to block out the suddenly blinding lights in the room. He needed sleep.

And then maybe he could convince Ze to show him more.

* * *

"We're friends," Ze told him that night, a heavy arm wrapped around Chilled's waist, "but we're also more than that."

Chilled was pretty sure he was referring to love. At least he hoped Ze was.

* * *

_Fooling around_ —as Ze called it—became a regular occurrence for them. Chilled learned a lot. Both about receiving pleasure and how to give it. Chilled's favorite thing was making Ze's words trip up and run into each other and eventually go silent as he gave into what Chilled thought of as The Wave. An overwhelming rush of intense sensation.

One day the doors slammed open right when they were in the middle of things.

And Chilled would never forget the fucking _look_ of utter confusion on Corpse's face. It made him smile just thinking about it.

"Stop giving Sykkuno ideas," Corpse told him later.

"Ideas?" Chilled feigned innocence. Okay, so maybe he and Ze hadn't been the most discreet, but he hadn't even considered that the green crewmate would try to start something with his imposter partner as well. _Good luck with that, little buddy._ Chilled was pretty sure the black imposter hadn't cared about anything in this life. The only time Chilled had seen something somewhat resembling an emotion on the other imposter's face was when he'd caught Corpse wrist-deep in a crewmate's intestines.

Corpse just narrowed his eyes and turned back to the panel, circling an area on their map. They were going to land in a couple of days.

"I'll tell them you killed her."

Chilled looked up, "What?"

"I'll tell them you killed Hafu, so that you don't fail for not killing anyone."

 _I did kill her,_ Chilled thought, _you were just my weapon of choice._

"Thank you," he said, and he really meant it. He didn't think he could do it all again. He'd sooner throw himself out the airlock. Corpse just nodded and they lapsed back into a comfortable silence.

He only later realized that Corpse cared enough to lie for him.

He didn't think that before meeting Sykkuno, the other imposter would have.

Maybe humans just had the innate ability to infect those around them with their unreal reality; a reality filled with love and pain and happiness.

And Chilled could say with certainty

that it was beautiful.

``

``

``

> _I am thinking of beauty again, how some things are hunted because we have deemed them beautiful._
> 
> —Ocean Vuong


	6. The Beginning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They land on the imposters' home planet.

**$: >** Descent sequence started...  
[ ■■■■■■■■■■ ] 100% Initial checks  
[ ■■■■■■■■■■ ] 100% Deploying parachute  
**Entrypoint** = bf50cfb1a49e4db4bfcd1  
**No fatal errors found  
** **Time:** 63038 ms  
  
**$: >** _|_

Landing was a blur.

Everything had gone too fast; it'd been too much all at once.

Sykkuno remembered that he'd stared out a small, circular window as they drew close to a white-blue planet. He'd felt dizzy with anxiety, his stomach flipping as the landing protocol echoed through the Skeld. More than half the surface of the approaching planet seemed to be covered in a permanent layer of frost. Shiny structures reached into the sky, elevated twenty or so feet above the ground by metal legs. Dome-shape abodes were built clustered together and transparent tubes connected them like an intricate web.

In short: it looked utterly alien.

Sykkuno remembered stumbling onto the ground—the crushing pressure of gravity bearing down on his frame—and being pushed into a small holding cell with Ze. There, both of them were fitted with a personalized collar and implanted with a microscopic tracking chip. The workers who did it were shaped like humans but something was _off_ about them; they fell squarely into uncanny valley territory. He wondered if Corpse and Chilled were just very skilled at shapeshifting, or if maybe these were younger imposters who hadn't gone on their Trial yet. After the initial examination, they were left in an empty room for approximately an hour before the wall slid open seamlessly and Corpse and Chilled walked in.

The white imposter immediately knelt in front of Ze and examined the collar he'd been fitted with. It was a sleek, white band with a little clasp at the back. "Sorry you guys were left here alone. The council had to decide whether or not we passed."

Ze blinked up at him, "well, did you?"

Chilled broke out into a grin, "yeah, don't worry buddy. We both passed with flying colors. Let's get you home and—" he lowered his voice as he helped Ze up onto unsteady feet, "—and we'll take off the collar."

The red crewmate raised an eyebrow, "is that allowed?"

"It's my nest, my rules."

Ze nodded and turned towards Sykkuno. There was a moment then—shared between the two of them silently—wherein they both came to a mutual understanding.

It was time to say goodbye.

Sykkuno felt tears well up in his eyes as they firmly shook hands.

"It was a pleasure to meet you, Sykkuno. I hope that we'll cross paths again."

"M-Me too," he blubbered and wished, once again, that he could be strong like the other crewmate. Instead, a tear slipped down his cheek and he couldn't even wipe it away with the visor covering his face. It trekked down to his chin and dampened the cloth around his neck. Chilled and Ze left, walking side-by-side, and Sykkuno watched them until they were out of sight. It was only then that he glanced over at Corpse, who was leaning against the wall of the cell like a pillar of night. Sykkuno sniffed back tears and shuffled over to him, quietly slotting their hands together.

"Ready to go?" the imposter asked and Sykkuno nodded, holding onto the other like a lifeline. They stepped into a trampled layer of ice outside of the holding area and Sykkuno's eyes widened at the expanse of white before them. Their ship had landed a quarter of a mile away and the cell was on the edge of the city, next to one of the metal legs that held the main network of structures up.

Instead of heading towards the cluster of buildings—which Ze and Chilled had left in the direction of—Corpse turned his back to them and led Sykkuno out into the undisturbed, flat plains of snow. All the other footprints went to the right; they went left. 

It felt strangely like stepping into a blank page; there was nothing. A clean slate.

It was just them, the stars glittering in the dark sky above their heads, and the soft crunch under their feet.

* * *

> _To be a monster is to be a hybrid signal, a lighthouse: both shelter and warning at once._
> 
> ― Ocean Vuong

_[[♪](https://youtu.be/WJVXOJrYjl4)]_

Corpse's nest was the abode of a hunter, through-and-through.

Like a hermit having given up on society, Corpse's home was a colorful collage of self-made tools, weapons, and structures. Along the wall there hung a collection of glinting, sharp-toothed slices of what looked to be glass, but there was a greenish hue to their surface that made Sykkuno think maybe the material was something else. There was a clunky radiator-like structure in the center of the room and it illuminated the walls with a dim, warm glow throughout the night and equally dim day (it was never sunny on the planet, Sykkuno realized after a week of watching the perpetually dark sky). Over it, Corpse roasted them various meats (flayed from creatures Sykkuno hoped he'd never encounter) with the occasional odd plant. Juxtaposed with everything else, there was a large, transparent screen that sometimes lit up the wall with text written in a foreign language. _A computer?_

Everything in the two room abode served a very specific purpose.

 _Except for me_ , Sykkuno mused wryly.

The air outside seemed to always have an icy edge to it, like breathing in too deep could cut his lungs. Even through his helmet, Sykkuno's breath turned white sometimes in the chill. The inside of the nest stayed strangely warm—warmer than a small radiator should have kept it—but sometimes during the night Sykkuno still felt the cold sink into his bones. Corpse never seemed to feel it, and Sykkuno remembered what Corpse's skin felt like; the imposter was cool to the touch, like a snake. He'd felt it even through his gloves. For the first few nights Sykkuno shivered, curled up in front of the radiator, but after the third night Corpse went out in the morning and didn't come back until evening. Sykkuno knew it was evening because strange wisps of blue and green always began to streak across the sky like arctic auroras. When Corpse returned, his hair was tousled and the front of his shirt was painted a neon blue. Sykkuno was confused for a moment, before he looked out the entryway and saw a bear-sized creature lying in a heap of stained snow. The creature's fur was matted with more of the blue liquid. _Blood._ It was blood.

Sykkuno watched mutely as Corpse took one of the shards from off the wall and walked back out the door. The imposter knelt in front of his slaughtered prey and Sykkuno had to turn away as Corpse surely slid the knife between the thing's pelt and muscles. When he was done removing the skin, Corpse slung the fur over his shoulder and dragged the skinned body of the beast around to the smaller structure at the back of the nest. His workshop.

That night, Sykkuno was given a blanket made of soft fur. The strands had been washed and it had a thick, leather backing that Sykkuno was certain was satin to the touch. He curled himself up tight in it, taking warmth from another being's skin, and realized all over again that Corpse was a hunter. Sykkuno's crewmates had just been exotic prey. There hadn't been malice behind the murders; Corpse hadn't cared enough about them to want to hurt them. It'd just been about the trill of the hunt for him. That was all. 

Corpse was a solitary predator. Sykkuno knew that the shapeshifter's species weren't big on relationships, but most of them also didn't live miles out from civilization. Sykkuno wondered what had happened to make Corpse want to camp out so far from the rest of his kind. 

Sykkuno had so many questions and he was too nervous to ask any of them. It'd been one thing to stay with the imposter on the ship, where he'd been dressed innocuously in a black spacesuit and tux. But now Corpse truly looked like a hunter. Most days he wore a tight shirt with black pants and he'd forgone his helmet the instant they'd stepped into his nest. He kept his human form most of the time, but sometimes Sykkuno swore he caught glimpses of a _creature_. It was huge, like a wolf, had three sets of glowing eyes, and pitch black fur. Sometimes at night it would slip out of the nest and, no matter how long Sykkuno stayed up, he never saw it return. In the morning he'd wake to the smell of meat sizzling and see Corpse's familiar figure sitting across from him, preparing their food.

And every time he stared up at the imposter—the world still blurry and unfocused with sleep—he'd think one thing: _Corpse is so pretty._

Sykkuno was somewhat baffled by his _own_ admiration of the imposter. Corpse's human form wasn't even real (whatever that meant). It was just one of the imposter's many shapes. One he pulled on and off like a shirt at his convenience. 

But that didn't make him any less beautiful.

Even when his jet black hair was plastered wildly to his cheeks with sweat and his face was freckled with blood, Sykkuno found himself thinking the same thing again and again. Which honestly probably just proved that his self-preservation instincts were as non-existent as Corpse said they were. There was just _something_ that drew him in. Maybe it was Stockholm. 

Maybe it was love. 

Corpse left in the early morning on some days to teach in the city and that left Sykkuno to wander around the nest, waiting for him to get home. He could leave if he wanted—walk right out the front entryway—but then what? There was nowhere to go and being with Corpse was a lot safer than being without him. Corpse was a monster, yes, but he was a familiar one. One that Sykkuno had long stopped being afraid of. 

He fidgeted with his collar as he walked in a circle for the umpteenth time. He wanted to do _something_ but he wasn't sure _what_. Corpse did everything around the nest, from cooking to cleaning. Sykkuno couldn't even pretend he was being kept as a servant; in fact, he was being treated more like a guest. Maybe more like a plant. He was fed, watered, given oxygen, and left in relative warmth. It would make sense, his suit being green and all.

But being a plant was mind-numbing. 

So one day as Corpse was getting ready for work, Sykkuno tugged on the imposter's sleeve and asked if he could come with.

Corpse didn't even pause, "no."

Sykkuno frowned, "but— I just thought maybe I could see what it's like in the city."

The imposter just shook his head and shrugged on a fur hide, "it's dangerous."

"Okay, well, is there anything that...I can do?" He fidgeted with his collar again, just spinning it around his neck, and the imposter sighed, but seemed to deliberate for a second.

"You can..." The imposter trailed off, "I'll talk to Chilled and ask him for a couple books you can borrow."

Sykkuno's eyes lit up, "you still talk with Chilled? How's Ze doing? Can we meet up with them?" Corpse seemed a little overwhelmed by all the questions and Sykkuno scolded himself for asking so many at once.

"Ze's alive," Corpse tilted his head, "and Chilled is teaching so I see him. No."

"Does he take Ze with him to teach?"

"No." Corpse deadpanned with an air of finality and walked out of the nest. Sykkuno followed him, stepping out into ankle-deep snow as he hounded the imposter. He was allowed to step in Corpse's deep footprints until they reached the boulder formation at the edge of Corpse's land and the imposter turned him around. With a gentle push, he directed Sykkuno back towards the nest. "Past the rocks there are beasts. Stay within the boundary."

Sykkuno nodded and sat on one of the boulders until Corpse's figure vanished on the horizon. When he looked up, there were two moon-like planets visible in the sky. The milky strands of a nearby galaxy spiraled between them like arms. A celestial hug. 

Sykkuno stared out over the wastes and felt a strange combination of awe and emptiness rush over him.

Back on Earth he'd always been searching for a purpose. A meaning. Something that would tie his world together with a neat little ribbon and force everything to make sense. 

Now he wasn't even sure what the word meant anymore.

* * *

The next day, Sykkuno put on a fur coat Corpse had made for him and waited in front of the entryway. Corpse nudged him to the side when he tried to leave for work but Sykkuno stubbornly didn't budge.

Corpse sighed. "We can talk about this when I get back."

"I want to go with you. I promise I'll be good."

Corpse took in a deep breath, " _Sykkuno_."

Sykkuno shivered at the way his name sounded coming like that from Corpse's mouth.

"Please," he whispered, more hurriedly, "I get lonely and—"

"I'll set up a meeting for you and Ze."

"I just want to see. I want to go _with you_."

Corpse shut his eyes and Sykkuno wondered if he'd pushed his luck too far. He was trying to childishly out-stubborn a creature who murdered other creatures as a hobby, after all. The imposter's eyes opened again after a long, quiet minute and Sykkuno looked deep into purple irises. They almost seemed to glow at times, and he recalled again how imposters had night vision. 

The imposter's hand landed on his shoulder, his nails pitch black, and Sykkuno wondered if that was their original color. The grip tightened for a moment—almost painful—before it fell away.

"I'll take you in tomorrow, when I don't teach. The fledglings can't be trusted around humans." Corpse growled the last part and Sykkuno swallowed hard. Without waiting for a response, Corpse lifted him off the ground and set him back down a foot away from the entryway.

Sykkuno was somewhat impressed his own legs hadn't given out.

As soon as Corpse left, he slid to the ground and pulled in his knees, breathing hard. He'd done it! He'd convinced Corpse to take him to the city. Nerves sprang to life in his stomach and he rubbed his thumb along the soft leather of his collar. He was Corpse's; nobody would hurt him. The collar was proof of that. He wondered if maybe he should have felt upset about about being seen as a _possession_ , but all he felt was security. It wasn't even like the imposter cared if he wore the collar in the nest or not; Sykkuno wore it because he wanted to. 

He doubted that anyone or thing would intentionally mess with Corpse or his belongings. That'd be stupid. Corpse seemed pretty intense, even by his kinds' standards.

With shaking hands, Sykkuno reached for one of the worn books Corpse had brought back with him the evening before. He stroked his hand along the fraying spine and flipped to the first page, his heart still caught in his throat. His eyes scanned the pages, went through the motions, but he didn't process a single word.

> It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way.
> 
> _— A Tale Of Two Cities,_ Charles Dickens

Sykkuno wondered where heaven could even be because he hadn't found it yet. He wondered if it even existed. He wondered which possibility was less disheartening. He wondered if maybe there was really nothing, and that he'd one day become that nothing. 

Space was nothing.

And yet humans had been staring up at it for centuries, marveling at its emptiness. 

That night it felt colder in the nest than usual. Sykkuno kept tossing, unable to find sleep.

Eventually he gave up and sat upright in his beast hides, pulling them tight around his shoulders as he stared into the dim glow of the radiator. After a while, even that got old and he stood up, dragging his furs over to where Corpse slept uncovered on the floor.

At night the imposter's human form slipped a little; Sykkuno had noticed this fact a while ago. The edges of his body looked faded, semi-transparent. At first it had scared him, but now Sykkuno just observed, enraptured by the rippling outline. It reminded him of a pond, the way water moved after a pebble was imparted into its depths. Sykkuno brushed a hand into Corpse's bangs and let the strands slip between his gloved fingers. The shapeshifter was so used to his presence that he hardly reacted anymore when Sykkuno sat with him like this at night. A hunter, lying at his feet like a tamed husky. _Dogs still howl at a full moon._

Without thinking too hard about it, Sykkuno spread out one of his furs on the ground and slotted his back against Corpse's chest, covering himself with one of the imposter's semi-formed arms. He draped the both of them with another one of his furs and pulled in his knees, pretending that Corpse was actually giving him a hug.

"Couldn't sleep?" Corpse's sleep-rough voice ghosted across his ear from behind and Sykkuno jolted before settling again. His heart pounded against his chest, right underneath the imposter's palm. Sykkuno shook his head and blushed when the arm around his waist tightened securely.

"It will be okay," Corpse murmured and Sykkuno clasped his hand around Corpse's, his fingers digging into flesh that yielded unnaturally to the force of them. 

Sykkuno trusted him.

He closed his eyes and within minutes he was asleep, calmed by the dull thud of three hearts beating softly against his back.

* * *

Walking through the frozen tundra was strangely calming that morning.

He followed behind Corpse's steps in the deep snow until they reached the edge of the city and Corpse slid their fingers together. The ground was more ice than snow around the edges of the network. The shapeshifter made sure Sykkuno was wearing his collar for the third time that morning and the human swore the imposter almost looked nervous.

Which was a silly thing to think.

Still, he gave the larger hand in his a reassuring squeeze as they stepped into a transportation tube that would take them up through one of the metal legs and into the city network. The platform creaked softly as they stepped on and Corpse hit a touch pad on a side panel that slid the doors shut. With a small jolt, the platform began rising at an accelerating speed. Sykkuno stared out the transparent panes as they shot upwards, bypassing wispy cloud formations as they neared the top.

Sykkuno stumbled when they exited and Corpse caught him with a sure hand on his shoulder, " _don't_ leave my side."

"Okay," Sykkuno readily agreed and clung to Corpse's arm. He did his best not to stare at any of the...creatures that they passed as they walked through the transparent tubes, but it was hard. Some of them had human forms, but most of them looked like various creatures—ranging from identifiable animals to formations Sykkuno had never seen. Some were just massless blobs, gliding along the floor.

Almost all of them had real humans trailing behind them—identifiable by their collars—and Sykkuno tried to make eye contact but none of them looked his way. They actively seemed to be avoiding it, in fact, keeping their eyes glued to the floor. Some of them were led by leashes attached to their collars. Others crawled on the floor next to their owners. Sykkuno saw very few of them who were allowed to walk untethered like he was. In fact, he felt almost like he was the one who had Corpse leashed, gripping the imposter's hand so hard he was sure it was uncomfortable. 

Some of the other shapeshifters seemed to notice that he was unleashed too and gave him leers before their eyes drifted to Corpse and they promptly looked away. Maybe staring was seen as disrespectful. Maybe they were scared of Corpse. 

Sykkuno could only assume that his imposter had a reputation.

They finally stopped in front of a large, white nest. There was an entryway in the front and the top narrowed into a circle that was covered by clear glass. Corpse sighed before he rubbed a hand over his face and pressed a little pad next to the entryway. After a few seconds, a hologram of a woman flickered to life and she raised an eyebrow when she saw them. Her human form was almost as good as Corpse's, from what Sykkuno could make out through the blue web of pixels. 

" _Luud vru kemorrae raks rek keda uk sra vromas. Is'k vrassae rora kur aeui su drakk iv reda o rikom, ressra vurkea_ ," she quipped, her eyes narrowing dangerously, " _I okkika aeui'ra rara su kaa Crerrad?_ " Her eyes flicked down to where Sykkuno was peeking out from behind Corpse's back. She switched to English, "ah, I see. Another human."

The hologram blinked off and the entryway slid open.

"W-Who was that?"

"Rae."

"Does she live with Chilled?"

Corpse stepped through the doorway, "no, she's the security for this side of the network."

"Security?! From what?"

Corpse just shook his head and pulled Sykkuno into a decontamination chamber. They were buffeted by pressurized air and then a new door slid open with a hiss. At first glance, the inside of the nest was smaller than Corpse's, but it was also a lot less cluttered. The only crowded area was along one of the walls, where piles of books were stacked in uneven towers. There was radiator in the center of the room and what looked like an approximation of a bed next to it. A screen was wrapped around half of the wall, and a video of what Sykkuno could only guess was the Amazon rainforest was playing. He hadn't seen trees in so long that the video of Earth looked almost as foreign as the wastes outside did. 

Sykkuno's eyes roamed the nest for a moment before they fell on a pink helmet lying on the the ground next to Ze's red one.

"The nest has oxygen," a voice rang from above them and Sykkuno's head snapped up, finding Ze and another human sitting on a loft near the circular top window. From it, there was a clear view of both of the planet's moons. The human dressed in a pink suit jumped down and landed on the bed with a practiced ease. He brushed himself off and walked over to Sykkuno, extending his hand confidently.

"I'm 5up, nice to meet you Sykkuno. Ze said you'd be coming over so I invited myself so that we could meet," the man had a calm, soft voice that instantly sounded both friendly and dependable. As Sykkuno shook his hand, he noticed that 5up only had a thin black cord around his neck. Hanging loosely from the middle of it was a golden ring, not dissimilar to a wedding band. 

"It's nice to meet you too 5up" Sykkuno ducked his head, smiling as they let go of each other's hands. He hadn't expected to meet a new person and he found himself floundering for a moment, trying to remember exactly how to properly greet someone. 

"Where's Chilled?" Corpse asked, bypassing introductions all-together.

Ze finished climbing down the ladder from the loft, "he's with Yeti getting supplies."

"They just left the both of you alone?" Corpse narrowed his eyes.

"What? Afraid that we'll start a revolution, big guy?" 5up teased, his voice light, but even Sykkuno could hear the challenge beneath.

"It's against protocol to leave humans alone together."

"Didn't know you were such a rule follower," 5up replied simply, lounging back against a wall.

"You don't know me."

Sykkuno swallowed nervously as he looked between 5up and Corpse, "guys, guys. Um, Corpse is here now so no rules are being broken! R-Right?"

5up smirked, "you're right, Sykkuno. No need for us to get heated. We have ourself a babysitter after all."

Corpse said nothing and sat down, "you have twenty minutes and then we're going."

"Seems that your distaste of the network wasn't overstated," 5up chuckled dryly, "that's alright. Come over here Sykkuno and I'll give you my chip number so you can call me if you ever need help. I'll also log yours."

"Wh-what!? Ok, uhm," Sykkuno fidgeted with his hands. He hesitated for a second before he followed 5up to the large screen. The pink crewmate flicked the screen and pulled up a document with a list of names and numbers on it. "These are the chip numbers of all the humans I've been able to meet with in the network so far."

Sykkuno glanced over the list, "five?" He read off _Lily, Michael, Yvonne, Tubbo, Ze._

"That's the number with _owners_ who were _gracious_ enough to let me talk to them. Well, now there will be six. Maybe seven, once I convince Rae."

Ze huffed, "good luck. She's never going to let us talk to Daph."

"I can be very convincing." 

Sykkuno remembered passing by at least twenty humans on his short walk through the tubes. The fact that only five other humans (plus 5up) in the entire network had somewhat lenient imposters with them was disheartening.

"Alright, take off your helmet and I'll scan your chip to get the number."

Sykkuno hadn't taken off his helmet in over a year. He swallowed his apprehension and started to fumble with the latches on either side. There was a small _hiss_ of air escaping as the airtight seal was broken and he lifted it over his head. For a second he worried that maybe the air wasn't breathable at all; that he'd suffocate. Then he took in a deep breath. Another one. 

He'd forgotten how it felt to breathe without a helmet. 

What it felt like to be able to _touch_ his face. 

In a daze, he pressed his hand to his cheek and Ze laughed, "it's pretty wild, huh?"

"Yeah," Sykkuno whispered.

5up smiled softly and picked up a little silver box, "I'm just going to press this behind your ear, okay?"

"Ok."

* * *

"Did you have...fun?" Corpse asked as they walked home through the snow. The word _fun_ sounded strange coming from the imposing shapeshifter's mouth and it made Sykkuno smile.

"Yeah, I had a lot of fun. Thanks for taking me."

Corpse nodded and Sykkuno threaded their fingers together. The motion was so normal now. Their hands fit perfectly, like they'd been shaped to do just that. Maybe Corpse had _literally_ formed his hand to fit Sykkuno's. The thought of that made something warm and twinkling light up under his ribs. 

When he looked out over the barren plains, level with a new layer of snow, he saw beginnings. When he looked up at the kaleidoscope of stars and the wisps of distant galaxies, he saw potential. A green aurora lit up the sky—painted the dark depths with smooth waves like a heavenly trail—and followed them home.

"Can I sleep with you again tonight?"

Corpse's breath was a cloud of white in the night chill, "if you'd like."

"You can sleep in your normal form, you know. If you want."

Corpse stayed silent but Sykkuno could tell that the imposter was thinking it over. Sykkuno stopped and slid his fingers up to wrap around Corpse's wrist firmly, making the imposter stop in his tracks. The action came with a wash of Déjà vu that wasn't lost on either of them. 

"You don't have to hide it anymore," Sykkuno said, "I already know what you are."

Corpse stared at him, his eyes a vibrant violet.

"What am I?"

The words were transient; thrown to the wind. Like a glass bottle tossed into the ocean, hoping to land by chance in the hands of someone with an answer. Sykkuno realized suddenly that they were both looking for meaning; for a definition to their being. Purpose was nothing but a massless concept and there was no answer. There was nothing but the shared heat of their clasped hands, and the ephemeral words they exchanged. Why did they even talk at all if after the words left their mouths there was no evidence they'd ever been spoken?

 _Because,_ Sykkuno thought, _because._

There was only Corpse's eyes—lit up from the inside like a nightlight—and Sykkuno's adoration for staring into them. He remembered the quote: _he who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you._ Perhaps he'd turned into a monster, because he no longer saw one in front of him.

"You're a lot of things," 

he answered,

"and I'm afraid of none of them."

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Translations for mobile users who can't hover text:**
> 
>   * _Luud vru kemorrae raks rek keda uk sra vromas. Is'k vrassae rora kur aeui su drakk iv reda o rikom, ressra vurkea:_ Look who finally left his side of the planet. It's pretty rare for you to dress up like a human, little wolfie,
>   * _I okkika aeui'ra rara su kaa Crerrad?:_ I assume you're here to see Chilled?
> 



	7. The New Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Corpse loves Sykkuno, even if he doesn't know what the word even means.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Note:** This chapter contains sexual situations.

_[[♪](https://youtu.be/iPdJM_7CgU8)]_

Sleeping next to a human

was like sleeping twice.

Sykkuno slept so deeply—so utterly absorbed in not being awake—that it made Corpse reconsider the action. Made him wonder if he'd ever truly slept once in his life. He knew that he closed his eyes, but he didn't think he'd ever been at peace while doing it. The human's oxygen tank glowed dimly in the nest, a constant beacon of ringed luminescence, and each draw of his lungs hissed softly through the apparatus. Even if Corpse didn't have night vision, he'd still always be able to know exactly where Sykkuno lay. Know exactly which small pocket of darkness his body of light took up.

Lately the human's chosen resting spot was the space between Corpse's arms. The crewmate liked being wrapped up, like cloth and skin could provide some kind of shelter that wasn't present in the walls around them. Sometimes he slept with his chest pressed against Corpse's back—his cool helmet resting against Corpse's shoulder blades, his arm curled tight around Corpse's middle—and Corpse wondered when he'd stopped caring that the human had the opportunity to slice his throat like that. Maybe he was becoming careless. Maybe in the past he'd just been overly cautious. Regardless, one thing was becoming increasingly obvious: his rational world had long become muddled by the introduction of the human.

Before, he'd never considered that there could be something greater than just living and hunting. Sustaining. That the thrill of hunts was only the tip of a sunken glacier of experience.

He'd never thought his life to be bleak until he'd been introduced to light. (Light, in the shape of a human with an awkward smile and soft eyes.)

Every time they visited Ze and Chilled, Corpse grew more frustrated. He could see that he was _missing_ something. It was just out of his grasp. The way Chilled smiled at Ze didn't make sense. The way they pressed their mouths together didn't make sense. He'd been raised to be a solitary, independent thing. They all had been, by a communal team of mentors. So why did Chilled lean his head on Ze's shoulder and act like he never wanted to let go? Why did it seem like their bodies converged to a single point, drawn together like they wanted to inhabit the other?

It was a weakness.

And Corpse hated that he could see bits and pieces of it in himself.

(After all, what use was a predator without its claws and fangs?)

He'd _known_ that something was wrong, but he hadn't thought himself capable of such a misstep. Such a flaw in being. He'd found himself getting too attached. Too reliant on seeing Sykkuno every day for The Thrill he usually sought in solitude while hunting in the wastes. The human was a treasure, greater than any of the trophies that lined his walls. Those were prized in their death; Sykkuno was only good as long as he was alive. As long as he was full of stutters and smiles and warmth. So fragile, yet so filled with vitality.

(After all, what use was prey if it didn't nourish?)

Corpse felt something dangerous puddle up inside of him at the thought of anything ever happening to his human. In fact, he didn't let himself think about it often; the thought of it made him ravenous, too unpredictable. If anything ever touched Sykkuno, he'd tear them limb from limb; he'd claw open their chest and paint the snow with their blood; he'd slice out their hearts and feed them to the beasts so that they could never ascend to The Great Vastness. Even that didn't seem sufficient though, and he knew that if the situation ever became an actuality there was no guessing what he might do. What his body would do for him.

He felt his claws start to form and he quickly snapped them back into the rounded, safe fingers of a human. His breathing had sped up, his body lit with a pre-hunt rush, and he consciously tried to calm his system down. No hunting, not tonight. Corpse glanced down to where Sykkuno was asleep on his chest, breathing even and slow, and ran a hand over the human's curved back. _It feels good,_ Sykkuno had told him a long time ago, when they'd still been on the Skeld, and Corpse studiously followed the path his past self had taken. Except now, instead of bones, he felt along the spots he knew the human liked best. Light pressure, just the hint of nail. As he trailed his fingers up the back of Sykkuno's shoulders the human sighed deeply and shifted, a drowsy smile on his lips.

The crewmate stretched out with a satisfied sound and when he spoke his voice was muffled with sleep, "I wish I could take off the suit. Then your fingers would feel even better."

Corpse considered the words. His nest wasn't equipped with oxygen like the ones in the network. Perhaps it wouldn't be a bad idea to implement one. He hadn't considered it before, but it would make things easier for his human. Sykkuno fumbling with his food receptacle, grimacing at the strange taste of human mouthwash tablets, and struggling with the cleaning machinery for his suit would be things of the past. It would also keep him inside the nest more—with less incentive to go to Chilled and Yeti's nests as often—and...

Corpse frowned. It wasn't that much of an inconvenience to take Sykkuno into the network, now that he knew that his human wouldn't run away and get himself killed, but it still put Corpse on edge. His nest was the safest. If it were up to him, he'd keep Sykkuno in it forever—build walls of ice around the perimeter that only he could scale—and hide Sykkuno away from everything dangerous forever.

But then Sykkuno would be sad. Sadness was dangerous for humans too.

So Corpse didn't. He took Sykkuno into civilization and felt his fangs press into his lip if his human was glanced at even _slightly_ wrong. It was a great expenditure of energy and an even bigger strain on his control, but the smile Sykkuno always wore on his face after the visits seemed to assuage the darker feelings that filled Corpse up. Besides, any feelings that weren't placated could be worked out during a later hunt. Still, it didn't change the fact that Corpse hated the network. Hated the others of his kind, their eyes. Always on him, always taking his flaws in. Hated how they made his hairs stand on end. How they reminded him of—

"—orpse?"

"Yes?"

"Oh, uhm. Sorry, I was just wondering if I could try something?" Sykkuno's eyes gleamed beneath his thick bangs with a familiar look of innocent curiosity. Corpse had long ago stopped trying to deny Sykkuno when he looked like that. He always gave in, in the end. He simply nodded and felt a small thrill at the responding beam he was given.

"Ok, so, I was thinking I could...return the favor?"

 _Favor?_ Corpse frowned in non-understanding and Sykkuno's eyes crinkled as he made exaggerated scrunchy motions with his hands, "I could massage you too, since you always do it for me."

The action seemed harmless enough, Corpse decided as he gave the human a small nod of acquiescence. With a victorious grin Sykkuno rolled over so he was positioned squarely over Corpse, his eyes all but sparkling with determination. Corpse regarded him curiously, not sure what his human had in store for him, but concerningly willing to find out.

"Alright, can you turn around please?"

Corpse froze for a moment before he huffed out a short breath and rolled onto his stomach. The things he did for this little creature. He felt Sykkuno's solid weight settle on the dip of his back as the human's gloved hands pressed against his shoulder blades. At first the touches were feather-light and exploratory, reminiscent of how Corpse usually touched the human himself. Then the fingers dug in a little deeper, rolled his skin a little, and Corpse's chest actually rumbled when the fingers dragged over a tense knot of muscle in his shoulders. The gloves Sykkuno wore had a rubbery texture, but the warmth and pressure of his fingers were more than enough to make up for it. Corpse relaxed into the treatment gradually, his face pressed drowsily against the warm furs. Beyond the nest it was late—the night-time auroras had all but faded from the sky—but in their cut-out reality time had no importance.

Sykkuno chuckled good-naturedly, "it looks like you have a lot of tension up here. I'm going to roll your shirt up so I can get to it better, okay?"

Corpse grunted in response, his body relaxed and warm. His shirt was rucked up gently under his arms and he was somewhat caught off-guard by his own contentedness. He was only roused from his comfortable state when the human's hands didn't resume what they'd been doing. When he turned to look, he saw that Sykkuno's eyes were locked on the myriad of scars that riddled the planes of his back. He supposed they were eye-catching. Perhaps especially so to a human, who wasn't used to seeing such wounds. Still, the unusual attention to them made Corpse slightly wary. He hardly thought about his scars anymore so he hadn't considered that Sykkuno might care to ask about them.

"You can't shape-shift them away?" Sykkuno asked, his finger ghosting the path of one of the more ragged cuts.

"The skin is dead so I can't control it," Corpse responded, keeping his voice level. Some weak part of him tensed up. Urged him to push Sykkuno off of him and abscond to some dark corner of the nest to nurse his wounds the way a bleeding-out creature might. Weak.

"D-Did you get them on a hunt?" The human blinked up at him then—his clear eyes strangely focused—and Corpse felt the easy lie of _yes_ die on his tongue. Corpse was good at lying, but he also knew when he'd been seen through. The wounds were too even, too consistent to have been made on a hunt. It was evident that Sykkuno had worked that out as well.

He decided to say nothing. Sykkuno's finger brushed against one of the gashes that wrapped neatly around his ribs and he growled a warning as he rolled around and grabbed the tiny hand with his own callused fingers.

"Do they still hurt?" Sykkuno frowned, his face scrunching up all wrong, and Corpse wanted to lie. _No, they don't._ The words were almost past his lips when the human pressed down on one of the deeper wounds with his free hand and Corpse flinched. The pain was dull, a deep ache more than a stab, but the wounds had been inflicted with the intent that they'd hurt forever. The skin was damaged just enough to confuse his body into trying to endlessly heal the various scars.

" _I'll kill them._ " Sykkuno whispered darkly and the words surprised Corpse. Why did the human even care? When had the human's words found more bite than his did? "Are they still alive?"

 _Yes._ "No." Corpse breathed, finally letting a lie slip through his lips. If, for some reason, Sykkuno was serious then he couldn't let his human get any dangerous ideas.

Sykkuno stared at him, searching his eyes for _something_ but Corpse let nothing show. Eventually the human's eyes narrowed slightly as his lips pressed into a thin line. His gloved fingers dug into Corpse's skin but they didn't hurt; they felt more like an anchor, tethering them together. Corpse didn't know why he found that thought so agreeable. The fingers tensed for a second and then lost their force, splaying out wide again on Corpse's chest.

There was a subtle tremor in Sykkuno's fingers as they left his chest to cup Corpse's cheek instead. The touch was so gentle, so tender, that Corpse leaned into it, blinking up at the crewmate. His human was distressed and he didn't know how to fix it but touching always seemed to help. The reciprocation made a punched-out sound leave Sykkuno's lips and the flushed, conflicted look in his eyes was so new that Corpse couldn't help but stare. Corpse didn't doubt the truth of Sykkuno's words, even if realistically the human had neither the temperament nor ability to hurt one of Corpse's kind. The rawness he saw in the other's eyes had him second-guessing the temperament part, however.

"The thought—" the words cut off and a frustrated sound left Sykkuno's mouth, "—the thought of something hurting you. Makes me so mad, I can't—" He took in another shaky breath, "I don't get mad often so I don't really know what to do. I feel kind of crazy." A heavy flush lit up his delicate features and Corpse wanted to see if the skin felt as warm as it looked. If it would burn his hands for getting too close. Like a moth to the flame he couldn't help himself from trying to touch; he placed a comforting palm on the side of Sykkuno's helmet.

"Nothing can hurt me like that anymore." It was almost the truth. It was true that he was the strongest of his kind. Certainly the strongest on the planet, at the very least, if strength were measured in ability to kill. He didn't mention how something about Sykkuno's tears tore him open deep inside, like an internal rupture.

The human opened his mouth to say something but then closed it again. His eyes were fixed on Corpse's lips and, oh, _kissing_. Maybe that was what Sykkuno was thinking of right then. The thought of their mouths meeting seemed somehow good. Then again, almost everything having to do with Sykkuno somehow seemed inexplicably good. Looking at Sykkuno's face made Corpse wish he knew more human words. He knew the word _soft_ but Sykkuno's eyes right then were so much more than just that. He wished he had the words to convey all the messy, chaos-born things he _felt_. He knew it was pointless to even try to piece together insufficient words though. So instead he took Sykkuno's hand in his own and pushed it back against his chest.

"It felt good," he said lowly, feeling slightly unsure, and hoped he was using the words right. His body could feel good. The sensations didn't just have to be painful. He...trusted Sykkuno to make them not painful. Trust was dangerous, but Corpse was done being cautious. He'd tossed it out of the window the moment he'd welcomed Sykkuno into his nest, into his life.

Probably even before all that.

Perhaps the trap had been laid out from the start, silently slipped beneath his feet to catch him up. Had caught him unaware the first time Sykkuno had looked at him on the Skeld and smiled the same smile that made Corpse's hearts bleed.

A strangled sound left Sykkuno as he dragged his hand back down Corpse's bare chest. The hand trailed lower and emotions that Corpse couldn't identify flickered across Sykkuno's face. The fingers shook across his skin, little pin-pricks of sun, and Corpse was torn between identifying the touch as reverent or timid. They lingered above his stomach, inched down, hesitated. Then the human withdrew his hand completely, shaking his head. Corpse instantly leaned forward and reached for his human, "what's wrong?"

Sykkuno shook his head again, his visor glinting in the low light, "I'm sorry. It's. I'm—"

Corpse frowned and checked the human over, trying to identify the problem. Sykkuno was breathing unusually hard and his face was a bright red. His body also seemed to be vibrating slightly, as though from exertion. When he looked down, Corpse noticed a tenting in the fabric of Sykkuno's pants that wasn't normally there. He reached for it and the human shied away, bringing his hand down between his legs to hide it, but he let Corpse brush the arm to the side easily.

"Does it hurt?"

"N-No, it doesn't hurt," Sykkuno's helmet was still bent downwards, hiding his face, "it's just embarrassing."

 _Embarrassing?_ Corpse tilted his head. He lightly brushed the back of his knuckles against the straining cloth of Sykkuno's space suit and the human choked back a surprised sound. He watched the crewmate's face intently but pain didn't cross his features. In fact, it seemed rather the opposite. Cautiously, Corpse wrapped his fingers around the strange hardness and Sykkuno all but collapsed against his chest. It was as though the single touch took away all his strength. The human's fingers clutched the imposter's shirt as his hips pushed up into the tentative circle Corpse's fingers made.

Corpse made mental notes as he worked out how this part of the human's body worked. Twisting too much was bad. Up-and-down seemed to garner the best results, if the soft hums and gasps were indicative of the human's pleasure.

When Corpse tightened his grip slightly, rubbing his thumb over the top just _so_ , a pitiful whine left Sykkuno's mouth. It was a nice sound. Corpse did it again, testing different strokes and strengths, until Sykkuno was panting and muttering a nonsensical stream of _thank you, thank you, thank you_ into the cloth of his shirt. He looked so small in Corpse's arms, so utterly dependent. So utterly _his._

The beast stirred in his chest then, pacing back and forth, its eyes glinting territorially.

He lifted Sykkuno off of the ground and slid him onto his lap so that he had a better angle. The human's grip never let up on his shirt—he was all but tearing the fabric with the way he was clutching it—but his legs instantly wrapped around Corpse's hips like a vice. The new angle turned out to be advantageous because after a few firm strokes the human began shaking, his breaths and motions turning erratic.

Sykkuno made a breathy, helpless sound—as though he'd been wounded—but he didn't move away. Instead, he clung to Corpse's shoulders, and pressed the two of them impossibly closer as he tumbled apart in the shapeshifter's arms. His grip was almost painful but Corpse found it strangely...he didn't have a word for it. It was good.

"Oh my gosh," Sykkuno gasped and his hips stuttered back against Corpse's palm a few more times before he jerked away with a shaky breath. His face was faintly shiny with sweat under the humid confines of the helmet and his bangs stuck messily to his forehead and cheeks. Corpse wanted to to brush the strands away. His hand was still curled, frozen midair, and he somewhat belatedly moved it to Sykkuno's back. For a few quiet minutes he held Sykkuno's lax body in his arms, marveling at the sheer warmth of the human.

When he pulled back Sykkuno's eyes looked a little less hazy, but a prominent blush still colored his cheeks, "uhm. Thank you for doing that."

Corpse just nodded. It wasn't like he'd done much.

Sykkuno hesitated and then looked down at Corpse's pants somewhat shyly, "do you want me to...do it for you?"

Corpse stared at him.

"I mean! We don't have to if you don't want to. I just thought maybe you might want me to uh, you know, reciprocate."

Corpse paused, not sure how to tell his human that he had no idea what had even just happened, and absolutely no idea how to replicate the ritual. "My kind doesn't do that."

"Oh, like, not at all?" Sykkuno asked, a small line of tension appearing between his eyebrows.

Another nod.

"Oh," Sykkuno said again, a little quieter, "uhm. I mean I knew that you don't kiss but...you don't do anything? Oh gosh. Ahh, okay, so humans have this thing called s-sex to reproduce. Well, it's not only for that because it also feels good? And, uh. I should have gone through all this before we actually did it. I—"

The human was getting worked up so Corpse put his hand on the crewmate's helmet and gave it a little pat. "I thought it was good." Corpse said, mostly to assuage Sykkuno's anxieties, but also because it was the truth. He'd been very intrigued by the human's reactions.

Sykkuno worried his lip but gave a little nod as he pressed his helmet back against Corpse's chest, "okay. That's good."

Good. Everything was good. Corpse lay back down, taking Sykkuno with him, and pulled one of their various furs over his little human's shoulders. He ran his fingers back down the crewmate's back and Sykkuno's eyes drooped again, slowly drifting back to sleep. One of Sykkuno's palms rested above Corpse's top-most heart, his fingers curled inwards as though he were holding it. Caging it, perhaps.

"I love you Corpse," the crewmate murmured, moments before his eyes finally slid shut.

Corpse's eyes didn't shut. He stared.

It wasn't until hours later that he stopped trying to decipher what those words meant and fell asleep, lulled into darkness by the human's even breaths and the consistent hiss of his oxygen tank.

* * *

> _Where did love begin? What human being looked at another and saw in their face the forests and the sea? Was there a day, exhausted and weary, dragging home food, arms cut and scarred, that you saw yellow flowers and, not knowing what you did, picked them because I love you?_

— Jeanette Winterson

Over the following weeks they installed an oxygen system in the nest.

Sykkuno turned out to know quite a bit about engineering from his crewmate days, even if he always seemed to fumble a little with the wires and screws. In the end, Corpse did the soldering and connecting while Sykkuno looked over his shoulder and read him instructions from a translated booklet 5up gave them. The air outside was dry and cold against Corpse's skin, but standing next to Sykkuno was like always having a portable heater pressed up against his side.

"Red and uhh, the blue connect over there on the right," Sykkuno nodded when Corpse plugged in the last few cables, "and I think that's it! I really hope I read off everything right."

"You did great," Corpse offered his human a small smile and got up from where he'd been kneeling in the snow by the new panel. He locked the oxygen cabinet securely and Sykkuno took his bare, red hands into his gloved ones.

"You should wear gloves too, your hands are all cracked," Sykkuno murmured as he rubbed his own hands over Corpse's to heat them up.

"I can reshape them."

"I guess," the human conceded but didn't let go of the shapeshifter's hand as they walked around the back of the nest to the entryway.

"It'll take a few hours for the nest to fill up with enough oxygen to be breathable," Corpse reminded as he re-examined the decontamination chamber attached to the door. He knew that he was acting overly-cautious but he also couldn't help himself as he made sure there were no cracks in the sealant they'd used for the fifth time.

Sykkuno hummed from inside of the nest where he was wrapped back up in furs and bent over the sewing project he'd started a few days before. Corpse had given him the washed pelts of their recent meals and Sykkuno had busied himself with sewing outfits to wear around the nest. Their _home_ , Sykkuno called it.

Home.

Corpse finished his inspections and walked back to Sykkuno, letting his human form slip as he curled around the crewmate snuggly. Sykkuno smiled as he leaned back against Corpse's black fur and he fit himself against the shapeshifter's large, wolf-like body. "You're like a big puppy," he said fondly, scratching his fingers behind one of Corpse's pointed ears. The motion earned him a satisfied huff as Corpse settled down in the furs to watch Sykkuno work. The human's sewing border-lined on dangerous—the gloves most definitely saved his poor fingers—but it wasn't irredeemable, and he slowly made progress on the hem of a simple shirt.

Corpse fell asleep somewhere around the thirty minute mark, listening contently to a story Sykkuno told him about the _family_ he'd had back on the planet Earth. His dream contained a smaller version of Sykkuno running through lush grass fields he'd only ever seen images of in books. In his dream the sun beamed down on the human's rosy face, illuminating him with a wash of brightness that Corpse always seemed to envision anyway. He dreamt of brightness.

He woke up to something on his face. To fingers gently patting his cheek. _Bare_ fingers.

Corpse bolted upright and he switched to his human form instantly, breathing in the air. Of course he couldn't notice a difference but, as he frantically reached out to check on Sykkuno, he almost felt like he couldn't breathe at all. His human was going to be the death of him. Was going to give all three of his hearts some kind of attack.

"Corpse, it's okay, it works. Hey," Sykkuno cupped Corpse's face with both of his incomprehensibly soft hands and turned his face.

Corpse still felt like he couldn't breathe right.

Sykkuno was looking at him, eyes alit with happiness and entirely clear without the glass dulling their color, and he was smiling so wide his perfect little teeth showed. Corpse blinked, then lifted his own hand to Sykkuno's bare cheek. When they visited Chilled and Yeti's nests he didn't let himself touch Sykkuno. Not in front of others. Nobody else could know how precious this fragile creature was to him; showing that kind of weakness was a liability to Sykkuno's safety. But now the urge to was too strong. He slid his fingers through Sykkuno's hair (everything about the human was soft, soft, soft) and then reverently pulled the human closer. He noticed that the human still had on his collar, despite having removed his space suit and changed into the clothes he'd sewn.

"I can't believe I didn't mess up the wires," Sykkuno laughed breathlessly.

"Why didn't you wake me up before you took off your helmet?" Corpse frowned, the accusation somewhat dulled by the awe in his voice.

"I wanted to surprise you," Sykkuno said simply, "plus you checked everything like a hundred times so it had to be safe!"

Corpse wondered why the human trusted him more than Corpse trusted himself.

Perhaps he would have wondered a little longer, had Sykkuno not chosen then to press their foreheads together. Up close he could smell the chemicals from the suit cleaner Sykkuno used and a fainter, new scent that Corpse wanted to endlessly explore.

"I've wanted to kiss you for so long," the human admitted, a strange mix of shy and raw.

"Show me how," Corpse murmured, his voice so low it sounded rough. He wanted to learn how to make his human happy in every way he could. Sykkuno's eyes crinkled as he slid easily into Corpse's lap and nuzzled his face into the crook of the shapeshifter's throat. There, at the pulse-point at the base of his throat, Sykkuno pressed his lips oh-so-softly for a second before he lifted his head again.

"I haven't done this either," Sykkuno said hesitantly, "I— I might mess it up."

"Just do what feels good for you," Corpse said, because at least Sykkuno understood pleasure, and it wasn't like anything but his human's pleasure mattered.

"Alright," Sykkuno's eyes drifted down to the imposter's lips as he wrapped his arms around Corpse's shoulders. He was so close. Without the suit, every part of Sykkuno's body felt so much more breakable, so much more fluid and real.

Then Sykkuno pressed their lips together and the sound he made as their skin met was _The Thrill_ in essence. It made Corpse's entire body light up and flood with heat as his fingers dug into the back of Sykkuno's shirt. He felt like tearing the human apart, like consuming him, like encasing him in gold and diamond to preserve his perfect shape forever. He growled and Sykkuno's hot breath puffed against his cheek, his small hands suddenly everywhere they could reach. They scraped up Corpse's shoulders, pulled at the collar of his shirt, sweetly brushed over his face. They ended up in Corpse's hair, tugging him closer, and Corpse let himself open up to kiss after kiss.

They were clumsy and tender and wild. It felt like Sykkuno was laying claim, pushing himself into Corpse's body only to leave a gaping yearning. A hunger for more. It drove Corpse slightly wild, his instincts crashing against his rationality. Sykkuno's tongue dragged over his teeth, across his canines, and it distracted him so completely that Corpse hardly noticed how the human brought him down onto the furs.

"I want to," Sykkuno panted, "I want to touch you more. Please, _please._ "

The desperate edge to the soft-spoken human's words left Corpse feeling somewhat winded. Sykkuno always managed to catch him off-guard though. Always managed to rip away everything he thought he was certain of. Like this, it was hard to tell which one of them was the beast. At least he wasn't the only wild one.

"Yes," he said, because that was the only answer he knew anymore when it came to his human. _Yes, yes, yes._

Sykkuno's warm hand moved up the shapeshifter's stomach, pressed against his muscles, and then he bent down and kissed Corpse again so softly that they hardly touched. Corpse ached for the contact. He dug his nails into Sykkuno's back to keep him close, feeling possessive despite them being the only living things within miles.

"You're so _beautiful_ ," Sykkuno whispered as he pressed a scattered array of kisses to Corpse's cheeks and neck, and the imposter was so out of his depth that he had no response except for a broken sound. He was pressed down as Sykkuno straddled his hips and the human covered him as completely as his smaller frame could, "and I love our home, and waking up to you cooking, and just s-seeing your face is like— it makes me so happy."

Corpse wished he knew how to respond. Wished he knew all the emotive, spacious words that Sykkuno did, but the concepts were still just sprouting into deeper understandings in his brain. Instead, he cupped the back of Sykkuno's head and brought their lips together again. It was an easier way to convey all the things he couldn't say. Sykkuno tasted like something completely new, completely unique, and it was perfect.

"You're mine," Sykkuno promised quietly as they pulled apart, and Corpse noticed how the human's fingers traced the collar around his own neck. It was almost like the collar was a sign that Sykkuno owned _him_ ; a sign that Corpse cared about the human enough to want to claim him. He did care. At least he'd realized that much. Cared as much as a creature like him could.

"Yours," Corpse agreed, because he found himself not caring who belonged to who as long as it meant Sykkuno never left.

He knew it was weak.

Except, maybe he was wrong about that too. He'd thought that Sykkuno was weak too when they first met. Now, the human was a reprieve. A place Corpse wanted to carve himself into, huddle inside. Strength had many shapes, and Corpse felt like none of them truly fit his skin. True strength wasn't just a powerful body; it wasn't just something he could pull on. True strength was Sykkuno, smiling down at him without a trace of doubt on his face. So open with how he felt. So stubbornly vulnerable. 

Corpse curved his hand around the back of Sykkuno's neck and they slowly pressed their lips together again. He closed his eyes, taking in the way Sykkuno's mouth felt, how their tongues slid against each other. They met without a trace of urgency. Sykkuno hummed contently above him, his hands dragging through Corpse's hair, and the shapeshifter realized with a sudden clarity that _this_ was the epitome of experience. Maybe it was just one of many, but it was a peak. 

And the peaks kept getting higher. 

Sykkuno whispered something in his ear that he didn't entirely understand before sinking between Corpse's knees, pushing them apart. The first touch to the area between his legs had Corpse jumping. 

_And higher._

Sykkuno's wet mouth, wet lips, wet—

Fuck. 

"A-All good?" Sykkuno asked, his lips red and shiny and wrapped innocuously around Corpse's member like he wasn't blowing Corpse's mind in a hundred different ways. Was he all good? Corpse couldn't remember the last five minutes. He felt dizzy, awash with a heavy, addictive rush of _want_ that flooded his entire body. 

"Yes," he forced out, his fingers fisted in the furs beneath them, "it feels good." 

He _desperately_ needed to learn new words. _Good_ didn't capture the feeling in the slightest. He could hardly comprehend it, much less try to articulate it. It was overwhelming. It was—

"Stop!" Corpse felt something tighten and surge inside of his stomach and he bolted up into a sitting position. Sykkuno pulled back immediately, concern written across his face. His _face_. Just looking at him caused another dangerous wave of heat roll through Corpse's body and he brought a hand to his sweat-wet face. 

"What's wrong? Did I hurt you? I don't know how the teeth thing really works yet," the words tumbled out of the human's mouth all at once. They were both frantic and wild-eyed so Corpse forced himself to calm down. 

He shook his head and felt feral and silly all at once, "I felt something...it felt like something was going to come out." Maybe he hadn't followed the human anatomy diagrams correctly. Maybe he'd gotten this part of his replication messed up. Sykkuno stared at him for a long second before he brought a hand to cover his mouth and a breathy laugh left him. The human's other hand moved to cover Corpse's on the furs and he squeezed it. 

"Oh my gosh, I was worried I'd bitten you or something. Uhm, the feeling you had is what we _want_ to happen. It can be a little...intense but it feels really good, I promise." 

Oh. The shapeshifter let his shoulders relax minutely and he stared at the small human sitting between his legs again contemplatively. He'd had bone-deep wounds that hadn't affected him as much as Sykkuno's tongue on his skin. It could be dangerous to proceed. Except...except Sykkuno said it wouldn't hurt, and Corpse was doing his best to trust the human. He wanted to. 

With a soft exhale, he dropped his hand to the furs and spread his legs again. Sykkuno's face was positively on fire as he quickly nodded and knelt back into his previous position. His fingertips pressed into Corpse's thighs and they felt grounding. They were probably the only things that kept him tethered to the ground as the human's mouth took him in again. Took him back into the heights. 

The feeling kept building. Kept taking him up and up until he found himself gripping Sykkuno's shoulder and trying his hardest not to make a sound as an explosion of sensation ripped through his body. It felt like being stabbed. In other ways it felt like the opposite. He whimpered as Sykkuno continued to stroke him, half-understanding all the things the human whispered against his ear as he did so. Praises, encouragements, _I love you'_ s. It was a surge of sensation all around and inside of him. 

He felt vulnerable.

He felt safe. 

He felt utterly vulnerable and undeniably safe all at once. 

Sykkuno rolled over onto the furs next to him and wrapped his arms around Corpse's waist, smiling shyly (but also triumphantly) up at him, "was that okay?" 

Okay meant adequate. It meant so-so. Corpse was certain that what had just happened wasn't simply Okay. Even the humans probably didn't have a word to adequately describe all the things his mind and body had just been through. If he weren't still blinking, he would have sworn that he'd ascended to The Greater Plain. Instead of answering, he discarded his human form and wrapped his body around Sykkuno's snuggly, curling himself into a nest for his human.

He felt like his mind was still floating somewhere a million galaxies away. 

He was exhausted. 

Sykkuno laughed when Corpse licked his cheek and the human stretched out against the shapeshifter's fur, making himself comfortable. They still fit together perfectly, even when Corpse didn't shape his body to exactly fit Sykkuno's edges and dips. Somehow they always just slotted together effortlessly. 

Corpse fell asleep to the feeling of Sykkuno's fingers stroking his fur. To the human's soft puffs of breath. To the other's warmth sinking into his very bones. 

And for the first time, 

it felt like he slept for real. 

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _*Coughs*_ just gonna...just gonna leave this here.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for all of your lovely comments. They inspire and motivate me like nothing else ❤
> 
> New chapters are added when inspiration strikes.


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